City of Secrets
by WildHeart22
Summary: The City of Bones from Jace's point of view.
1. Chapter 1

**Hey guys :) So I know this has been done a lot, but I really liked the idea of it. So, this is the City of Bones from Jace's point of view. I hope you enjoy it :D**

**Disclaimer for the whole story: I do not own any of this. Cassandra Clare does, I'm just putting how I think Jace felt during the whole thing.**

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I gazed across the crowded room, watching the blue haired boy with narrowed eyes. My gaze followed his every move carefully, not missing a single little flick of a wrist or turn of the head. He watched his surroundings with a clear intent to find something. Suddenly, the boy jerked up, standing up straight and alert.

_Isabelle._ I smirked as I watched her give the freak a seducing smile. Her white, old-fashioned dress covered almost all of her skin, a stark contrast to those around her who wore as little as possible. With a back-handed smack to Alec's arm, I began to sneak silently behind the enthralled boy, my close friend hot on my heels. I watched Isabelle lead him into a door marked NO ADMITTANCE. I stopped just outside, Alec halting at my side.

I looked to him with a smirk. "Three, two, one," I whispered, pulling a large knife out from my jackets pocket.

I pushed the door open and slipped inside, Alec shutting it quietly behind me.

"I haven't seen you here before," the boy said.

I watched her carefully as she responded.

"You asking me if I come here often?" I rolled my eyes as Isabelle giggled, reaching up one hand to cover her mouth, her sleeve slipping down as she did, to reveal the curling dark lines of her speed rune.

I watched as green-eyes caught sight of the mark. He froze.

"You-"

Isabelle cut him off, slamming her palm roughly into his chest, knocking him off balance, but not really doing damage. Before he could come to his senses, she had her golden whip out. She cracked it with a flick of the wrist and it wrapped easily around the unfortunate boy's ankles. In one swift movement, she had jerked back on the whip, knocking him down to the ground. She laughed over the boy, who seemed to be disoriented. With one last securing yank of the whip, she grinned.

"He's all your boys."

I laughed while Alec and I stepped up behind him and I grabbed him roughly by the shoulders, slamming his back against a pillar. Alec grabbed his hands and tied them with wire found on the floor of the room. I walked around the pillar to stand before the demon. He struggled uselessly against his bonds.

"So, are there any more of you?"

"Any other what?" The boy asked.

I almost grinned.

"Come on now." I lifted my arms up, allowing my black sleeves to fall down to reveal the bold inking all over my arms and hands and giving him plenty of time to take the runes in before slipping my hands into my pant pockets.

"_Shadowhunter_," the demon hissed, almost spitting the word.

This time I did grin.

"Got you."

Alec and Isabelle stood behind me silently. I crossed my arms over my chest, pacing back and forth in front of the Goth boy.

"So, you still haven't told me if there are any other of your kind with you," I stated calmly.

"I don't know what you're talking about," the boy said, his tone sounding slightly higher in pitch than before.

Whether it was from pain or lying, I couldn't distinguish.

Alec spoke up behind me, "He means other demons. You do know what a demon is, don't you?"

The demon turned his face away from us, his jaw moving-probably his second set of teeth making an appearance. Eidolon demons all have them, no matter what form they had shifted into.

"Demons," I said lazily, writing out the word in the air. "Religiously defined as hell's denizens, the servants of Satan, but understood here, for the purposes of the Clave, to be any malevolent spirit whose origin is outside our home dimension-"

"That's enough, Jace," Isabella cut in.

"Isabelle's right, nobody here needs a lesson in semantics-or demonologoy," Alec seconded.

I lifted my head and smiled, seeing the fear spike up in the demon's eyes at my predatory gesture.

"Isabelle and Alec think I talk too much. Do _you_ think I talk too much?" I asked, the smile still in place.

The demon remained silent, not giving me an answer for a minute and I was just about to speak again when he finally talked, still working his mouth against the grind of his second row of teeth.

"I could give you information. I know where Valentine is," he said pleadingly.

I glanced back at Alec to see him shrug. Valentine's name brought up all kinds of violent feelings in Shadowhunters. Too bad this demon didn't seem to be aware of that.

"Valentine's in the ground. The thing's just toying with us," I said firmly.

"Kill it, Jace, it's not going to tell us anything," Isabelle said, flipping her hair over her shoulder.

I grinned and raised my blade, a crystal knife with a hilt inlaid with blood-red stones.

The demon tugged furiously at the wire binding him to the pillar. "Valentine is back! All of the Infernal Worlds know it-I know it-I can tell you where he is-" he pleaded pathetically.

I felt fury rush up quickly, my blood heating up.

"By the Angel, every time we capture one of you bastards, you claim you know where Valentine is. Well, we know where he is too. He's in hell. And you-you can _join him there_," I spat, tilting the blade in my hand.

"Stop! You can't do this," a female voice cried.

It had surprised me so much that I whipped around, my blade slipping from my grasp and clanging on the bare cement floors. I caught Isabelle and Alec turning as well. How had someone snuck up on us so easily?

"What's this?" Alec declared, stunned and slightly angry by the sound of it.

He looked from the girl who had just appeared in sight to Isabelle and I, as though we were supposed to understand what the hell a mundie was doing here. I looked her over, my eyes narrowing. She was short, red, frizzy curls framing her heart-shaped face. Her eyes were a bright green, shining in the dim light of the room. I relaxed myself easily. She's clearly just a mundie, nothing to worry ourselves about.

"It's a girl. Surely you've seen girls before, Alec. Your sister Isabelle is one." I took a step forward, looking the girl over carefully, making sure she wasn't armed even though I was sure she wasn't any danger.

It pays to be cautious, as I've always been taught. If you're not cautious you could end up with a blade in your back. Or any other part of your body. That's perfectly possible too.

"A mundie girl," I said. "And she can see us," I added as an afterthought.

The girl looked indignant.

"Of course I can see you. I'm not blind, you know."

"Oh, but you are," I said, crouching down to retrieve my weapon. "You just don't know it."

I stood back up to look at her once again. It's only fair to give the girl a warning.

"You'd better get out of here if you know what's good for you."

I saw her set her jaw. "I'm not going anywhere. If I do, you'll kill him," she said, pointing directly at the stupid demon.

I twirled my knife through my fingers, cocking an eyebrow.

"That's true," I confessed honestly. "What do you care if I kill him or not?" I was curious.

Mundies will watch the news every day and see people missing, dying and dead but they don't bat an eye. So why does this little mundie care about saving a boy she doesn't even know, endangering herself to do so?

"Be-because you can't just go around killing people," she stuttered, her eyes flickering to the demon.

"You're right. You can't go around killing _people_," I acknowledged before gesturing to the demon.

His eyes were nearly closed and I ignored his attempt to look weak.

"That's not a person, little girl. It may look like a person and talk like a person and maybe even bleed like a person. But it's a monster," I said.

"_Jace_," Isabelle hissed in warning. "That's enough."

I watched as the mundie began to back away from me hastily.

"You're crazy. I've called the police, you know. They'll be here any second," she threatened.

"She's lying," Alec called from behind me, although there was a slight hint of doubt in his voice. "Jace, do you-"

A sharp, ear piercing wail came from the side and I turned just in time for the blue-haired demon to slam into me. We tumbled to the ground, my back hitting painfully. We rolled across the cold, hard floor and the demon began to rip at me with hands tipped with wickedly sharp claws, glinting claws. I saw movement to the side out of the corner of my eye, where the mundie girl had been, but didn't bother to acknowledge it, focusing instead on the demon who-in this position- had every chance to kill me. I heard Isabelle screeching while the demon sat on my chest. He clawed at me, breaking through my fighting clothes and into my skin. A stinging pain lingered wherever his claws raked down my chest. Finally, the thing got smart and pulled his hand back for a stronger blow, this time to my face. I flung my arm up to keep my face from getting slashed and felt his claws shred into the skin of my forearm, feeling like a red hot blade was being dragged across my skin. Warm blood splashed from my arm as the demon pulled back to attack again.

Just before his talons came into contact with my body, a golden lashed across the demon's back, causing him to emit a high-pitched shriek and tip off of me and to the side. Before the demon could even move, I had rolled to the side and stabbed my knife into the demon's chest. Ichor, the black blood of demons, splattered disgustingly around the hilt, coating me in a large amount. The demon's back came up off the floor as he writhed around in agony. Ichor leaked from his lips and I felt somewhat like kicking him in the ribs childishly.

I stood up painfully, noticing both my blood and the demon's coating my clothing. I yanked my knife out of the quickly fading demon. The thing's eyes zeroed in on me, burning with rage.

"_So be it. The Forsaken will take you all_."

I twisted my face up into a snarl and watched while the ugly thing disappeared entirely, back to his home dimension. Hopefully for good.

Alec marched over to me and took my injured arm. He whipped out his stele, pushing my shredded sleeve up to reveal the ugly wounds. He sighed and burned a healing rune into my skin. I felt the wound began to close up a little, the blood flowing much slower although it was still stinging painfully. I heard the familiar sound of Isabelle's golden whip cracking through the air. I twisted my body around to face the sound and saw Isabelle's whip wrapped tightly around the mundane's thin wrist. It was already stained with ichor and if there was nobody to intervene, there was going to be mundie blood on it as well.

"Stupid little mundie, you could have gotten Jace killed," she spat through her teeth.

I was about to tell her to lay off, that I was fine, when the girl spoke.

"He's crazy. You're all crazy." I ignored that she was blatantly insulting us and focused instead on the whip tightening on her skin, realizing that Isabelle was getting a little out of control.

It's not like the girl knew what she was doing. She had actually been pretty brave, for a mundie. Most wouldn't even think of trying to save a life if their own was in danger, but not only had this girl tried to stop us, but now she was standing up to Isabelle with barely a flinch.

"What do you think you are, vigilante killers?" I resisted the urge to chuckle. "The police-"

"The police aren't usually interested unless you can produce a body," I finally cut her off.

Holding my arm tightly to my chest, I carefully made my way across the cluttered floor toward the girl, hearing Alec follow behind me only because his footsteps were heavy, signaling his anger. I followed the girl's eyes to where the Eidolon demon had disappeared, not leaving even the slightest trace of its existence. If only the blood disappeared from clothes like it did from everywhere else when the demons died. It would make cleaning gear and weapons so much easier.

"They return to their home dimension when they die, in case you were wondering," I said, seeing the confusion and shock in her face.

"Jace, be careful," Alec hissed at me.

I drew my arm away and watched the girl. She was pretty, I have to admit. Not in Isabelle's kind of way, but in a way uniquely hers. Isabelle was tall and dark, absolutely stunning and she knew it. She used her looks as well as her own whip, while this girl was pretty in a completely untraditional way.

"She can see us, Alec," I pointed out. "She already knows too much."

"So what do you want me to do with her?" Isabelle asked sharply.

"Let her go," I said quietly.

The girl didn't know what was going on, why should she be attacked based on ignorance? Isabelle looked at me in shock and anger, but complied, the whip releasing the red-head, who rubbed her wrist as though in pain. I felt like glaring at Isabelle. What's the point in hurting someone who was no danger to us? I started for a second when I realized that I was being _protective _of the girl.

"Maybe we should bring her back with us," Alec suggested. "I bet Hodge would like to talk with her."

"No way are we bringing her to the Institute," Isabelle almost snarled. "She's a _mundie_."

She spat the last word and I raised a brow. It seems like Isabelle is treating this girl like a vicious demon more than a confused little girl.

"Or is she?" I said, quietly. "Have you had dealings with demons, little girl? Walked with warlocks, talked with the Night Children? Have you-"

"My name is not 'little girl'," the girl cut me off, speaking crossly. "And I have no idea what you're talking about."

I thought I detected a hint of doubt in her voice as she continued. "I don't believe in-in demons, or whatever you-"

"Clary?" A male voice called out.

I peered behind the girl, who spun around to face the boy. He was geeky and not too attractive, wearing a MADE IN BROOKLYN t-shirt and jeans. He wore glasses and had dark hair. A brawny bouncer stood with him, looking bored to tears around the empty room-at least as it appeared to him.

"Are you okay?" the boy asked, looking closely at the mundie girl-Clary. "Why are you in here by yourself? What happened to the guys-you know, the ones with knives?" I fought the urge to smirk.

Her gaze flicked from the boy to behind her, resting on Alec, Isabelle, and I stood. I grinned and gave her a half-mocking, half-apologetic shrug. I didn't expect anything else, but I did feel bad for her having to explain why she was in a room all alone, talking to herself after apparently pointing out two guys with knives. I hoped that she didn't end up in an asylum.

She didn't seem to be surprised by the mundies' reactions. She slowly turned back to the boy, clearly struggling for an explanation that wasn't going to get her committed.

"I thought they went in here," she said weakly. "But I guess they didn't. I'm sorry." Her eyes flickered back and forth between the bouncer and her friend and I bit my lip to hold back a chuckle.

The boy's expression shifted from concerned to deeply embarrassed. The bouncer looked irritated.

"It was a mistake," she finished.

Isabelle giggled by my side and I elbowed her in the ribs. She scowled at me while the small group of mundanes exited the room.

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**Hope you like it :D I already have a couple more chapters written so if you want more, review and let me know!**

**-Cass**


	2. Chapter 2

On the way back from our hunt-one with a plot twist that would give any great author a run for their money-Alec droned on about how we would have to tell Hodge everything that happened. I rolled my eyes again when he repeated that mundies shouldn't be able to see us. Before he could continue, I cut him off.

"We know, Alec. We heard you the first _twenty _times. I'm pretty sure every shadowhunter knows that mundies shouldn't have the sight. But clearly, for whatever reason, little redhead there is an exception. So stop lecturing us on things that we are clearly already aware of. We have Hodge for that."

He blinked at me a few times, his blue eyes seeming owlish in the light from the take-out place beside us. Isabelle raised an eyebrow at me, but said nothing to deny my little spiel.

"What crawled up your ass?" Alec finally asked.

I bit my tongue to keep back a smart comment about what exactly could go up _his_ ass.

"Nothing, Alec. We already know that this is weird, even for us, so we don't need to hear it twenty times," I said with a sigh.

He huffed before turning back around and beginning to walk again. Isabelle slipped over to my side.

"Seriously, Jace. What's up? You never pick at Alec about his lectures," she said, lifting one dark, perfectly tweezed eyebrow.

I shrugged, looking forward at Alec's back. The streets were fairly quiet. There were a few mundies walking around but honestly, try walking around _anywhere_ in New York City at _any time_ and not see at least one other person.

"Usually hunts put me in a good mood. This one was just…freaky. And tiring. I want sleep. And I want a fresh shirt," I said, pulling the front of my shirt away from my chest, the ichor and blood causing the stiffening fabric to cling to my skin.

She smirked at me.

"Aw, does little Jacey need a nap?" she teased, loud enough that Alec looked back with a smirk.

I rolled my eyes, pushing her playfully away from my side.

"Oh, I think he does. He's in a pissy mood. Hmm, maybe he doesn't need a nap, just some Midol," Alec said with a grin.

I narrowed my eyes at him. "You're going to need some tampons yourself once I stick my foot up your ass," I growled lightheartedly.

He just laughed at me as we walked up to the institute doors. He pulled a little key out of his pocket and stuck it into the door. It opened with a click and he pushed it open, walking in ahead of us.

We walked through the wooden pews, the candlelight casting strange, flickering shadows onto the stone flooring. We walked into the rickety old elevator, still bickering among ourselves.

As much as I wanted to head to my room, get a shower, and go to sleep when the elevator doors opened, I knew I needed to go talk to Hodge before I could do anything. We walked down the empty, familiar halls until we reached the library. I pushed the doors open and held them for Alec and Isabelle before I followed them in.

"Hodge?" I called into the incredulously large room.

Shelves reached up to the ceiling, books shoved tightly into each little space. The warm, homey atmosphere of the large place was completed by the overstuffed sofas creating a little square around an old, Persian rug, covering a section of the mosaic we stood on. I knew that if I stood up on the second floor that I would see the setup covered only a tiny part of the angel Raziel. A coffee table sat in the middle of the set-up, with a small stack of books resting on it. From behind the counter to the left, Hodge's slightly hunched form stepped out of the shadows.

"You've returned from your hunt? Successfully, I assume," he said with a warm smile.

The three of us exchanged a look. Alec and Isabelle stepped back, leaving me with the duty of explaining to Hodge about what happened in Pandemonium. I sighed. Typical.

"Well, yes? I think. The demon is dead, so I would say so. But when we were there, there was this mundie girl. And she saw us. Like _saw_ us. As in, she saw through our glamours. And they weren't malfunctioning because no other mundanes could see us," I explained quickly.

Hodge's expression darkened, his eyes becoming wider. I heard Isabelle scoff behind me and fought the urge to smirk. She liked long, elaborate, exciting stories, not brief, boring reports.

"What do you mean she saw you?"

And so I broke into the story of out hunt, not leaving out a single detail, which I'm sure Isabelle was pleased with.

Hodge's expression had calmed some by the end, but his eyes were still wide, his shoulders tensed.

"A mundane that can see us? That is…troubling. I have never heard of something like this," he said wearily before seeming to come to a decision.

"You must bring her here. I wish to speak with her, see what she knows."

I snorted.

"Didn't seem like much from my point of view. She was trying to protect the stupid demon. Thought we were killing a human," I said with a little smile.

"It's better to be safe than sorry, Jace. I need to speak with her. She may be dangerous."

"I'll go," Alec offered, just as I scoffed at the thought of the mundane being _dangerous_.

Hodge had nodded before I could process it.

"No way. I'm going," I protested, trying and failing to not sound childish.

Hodge raised a gray brow, causing more wrinkles to appear on his aged, kind face.

"Do you not trust Alec's capabilities to bring the girl back safely?" he questioned.

I wrinkled my nose.

"I didn't say that. I just stand a better chance of bringing her here willingly," I said, raising my chin.

"And why is that, Jace?" Alec asked tiredly.

"I'm charming, and highly attractive," I said with a cocky smirk. "If you were of the opposite gender, wouldn't you go with me?"

"Jace-"

"People tend to find blondes more trustworthy, you know," I shot out randomly.

I don't know where the hell that came from, but it made everyone's eyebrows furrow. I bit my cheek, hoping Hodge would agree to let me go retrieve the mundie. She made me curious. How could she see us? And what was she like? She's brave as hell for a tiny, human girl. I could snap her like a twig with my pinky, yet she stood up to me with Alec and Isabelle backing me up. Or maybe she was just stupid.

I tilted my head to the side. No, I don't think she's stupid. Just…careless, rash. And brave. I couldn't get the adjective out of my head. What mundie would intervene with Shadowhunter business even if they _could_ see us?

"Why do you want to go so bad?" Alec finally snapped.

I raised a light brow at his hostility.

"I-"

"Stop it, you two. Jace, tomorrow you may go retrieve her. For now, you all need rest. And a shower, Jace, you smell," Hodge pointed out.

I blinked as he turned his back, calling to Hugo, his pet raven.

"Well that was uncalled for."

I turned to Alec, who rolled his eyes and turned in the direction of the large double doors. I followed him through them. We walked side-by-side down the corridor, Isabelle striding in front of us. We walked silently, our footsteps echoing in the quiet halls.

I reached my room first and peeled off from Alec's side, opening the door. The three of us said our goodnights and Isabelle wished me luck bringing the mundane back, reminding me to use a glamour because 'I'm not going to be there to create a scene. Not everything has to center around me getting people to look at me'.

I closed the door and slipped my fighting gear off. I took a quick shower before getting ready for bed.

When I slept that night, I dreamt of a redheaded girl with blazing green eyes. I dreamt that she was here, in the institute, the safe haven for all Shadowhunters in New York City. No mundane had walked these empty halls in hundreds of years. I dreamt that she filled the hollow corridors with life and energy. Her laughter and smiles lit up the uniform spaces.

And when I woke up in the morning, I didn't remember a minute of it.

When I woke up, I thought briefly about wearing fighting gear, but passed on the idea. I was only going to retrieve a mundie-Clary, I remembered absently- not fight a demon. It's not like the little girl could put up much of a fight at all, even if she tried, which I have no doubt she would if she didn't willingly come with me.

_Good thing I'm physically appealing,_ I thought with a little grin to myself.

I poked my head into the kitchen, sighing in relief when there was no sign of Isabelle attempting to be a surrogate chef during Maryse's absence. Let me just say, Maryse's cooking skill did not get handed down to her daughter. It made me wish that the mother hen figure of the institute wasn't away as often. But with the Accords- the peacemaking between Shadowhunters and other human-like creatures of the shadow world-being signed in Idris, both Lightwood parents and their youngest son, Max, were pretty busy. As many Shadowhunters as possible had been called into the City of Glass.

I thought wistfully of the Shadowhunter home country. It was the most beautiful place I had ever seen, that I could remember even though I had been young that last time I was there. The Demon Towers, which had stood sentinel for hundreds of years-always protecting the beautiful city from any demon who would try to cross into their borders-shined like diamonds in the sun's light.

Living in the countryside as I grew up, my childhood home hadn't been protected by demons, although few dared to ever venture into Idris anyway. We had never been visited by a demon during the eight years I grew up there.

I finished my toast-which I didn't remember making, being too lost in thought- and stepped out into the hallway, just as Isabelle passed by. She turned to me with a grin.

"Heading out for the mundane?"

I walked besides her, heading towards the elevators.

"Yep," I confirmed.

She nodded with a smirk on her red-painted lips.

"Don't scare her too much," she warned, pointing an accusing finger at me.

I put my hands up, palms facing her, in surrender.

"Okay, you got me. I was going to try and ask her to go on a hunt for rogue bloodsuckers. But you may be right, maybe she'll find that mildly frightening," I said.

She rolled her eyes with a scoff.

"Whatever. Just bring her back."

I nodded, giving her a goofy salute before stepping into the small elevator.

Once I reached the sidewalk outside of the Institute, I stood for a minute, wondering where she would be. Maybe this wouldn't be as simple as I thought. How was I going to find her? It was clear that she wouldn't be in Pandemonium. I huffed, deciding to just walk in that direction. It couldn't hurt.

If she had been there then she probably lives somewhere nearby. I absentmindedly pulled a bone-handled knife from the wide metal cuffs on my wrists. I expertly twisted the blade through my fingers, feeling the cool metal glide between my fingers easily.

I began to just wander aimlessly once I actually reached the popular club. I paced through the streets, my knife flashing reflected midday sunlight onto buildings and people as I passed them. I had been watching one particular reflection when my eye caught something in the window it had been shining on. A flash of red. I halted immediately, looking closer.

I grinned widely as I walked back a few step to the doors of the small coffee house. The doors shut quietly behind me as I entered the calm atmosphere. I glanced around with a frown. The ability to create a space so calm, so serene, is something only mundanes possess. For Shadowhunters, it's always about the fight, the rush from it. We don't bask in the peace and quiet like normal humans. Our lives take place in the never-ending battle. We don't have time to luxuriate in calm moments. And that is the only thing I envy about mundanes.

I began walking up to where the redhead mundie sat, until I saw a blonde girl slip over and began talking to her. She glanced across the room at something before turning back to the blonde with a reply that I couldn't hear. I sidled closer, not wanting to alert the girl of my presence quite yet.

I slipped by just as the blonde scuttled away only to have a brunette boy take her place. He set two coffee cups down on the table in front of them. I dropped into the seat behind the two, watching them with narrowed eyes. I saw that the girl was just about to speak, when a sharp, ringing sound filled the little building. I flinched, wanting to cover my ears. The sound abruptly ended and was replaced with a teenage boy's voice. I rolled my eyes at his introduction, tuning him out to focus on the two mundanes in front of me. They weren't speaking, but staring at the stage with pained expressions as he began his 'poetry'.

Even I grimaced when he began wailing into the microphone.

"Please don't tell anyone I know him," the brunette boy said, looking at the girl beside him.

She giggled and I smirked lightly.

"Who uses the word loins?"

When she smiled, I realized that it lit up her whole face. It was like a little spotlight was shined right on her, demanding everyone's attention. I saw a boy a few tables over look over at her, his eyes wandering from the girl sitting across from him. I scowled at him as his date tried to get his attention.

"Eric. All his poems have loins in them," the boy said with an unattractive grimace.

His glasses made his face look very tiny and scrunched up when his facial expression changed.

"Anyway, about that girl who thinks you're cute-"

"Never mind that for a second," the annoying boy cut in.

I raised a brow. What I wouldn't give to have been there for that conversation. I'm willing to bet that that was what the two girls had been conversing about. Clary blinked at the boy in surprise.

"There's something I wanted to talk to you about."

I narrowed my gaze a little, taking in how the boy fidgeted a little in his seat. He seemed to be sweating a little as well.

"Furious Mole is not a good name for a band."

I blinked, one light eyebrow arching even higher. What the hell?

"Not that," the boy said, "it's about what we were talking about before, about me not having a girlfriend."

I smirked a bit at that. So they weren't dating. But it's pretty clear that he wishes they were.

"Oh. Oh, I don't know. Ask Jaida Jones out. She's nice, and she likes you," she suggested with a shrug.

My smirk morphed into a full blown grin. This girl is clueless. The boy was fidgeting in his seat, clearly uncomfortable. I didn't blame him. You think she would've gotten it by now. Hell, I did and I've never seen him before in my life.

"I don't want to ask Jaida Jones out."

"Why not?" she asked, her expression changing to one of distaste. "You don't like smart girls? Still seeking a _rockin' bod?_"

Clearly, they had discussed something like this before. I saw the resentment in her features as her face scrunched up a little.

"Neither. I don't want to ask her out because it wouldn't really be fair to her if I did…"

I rolled my eyes. Clearly she wasn't getting the not-so-subtle hints.

The girl leaned a little towards him, and I caught the blonde doing the same and rolled my eyes. There really was no subtlety in this place.

"Why not?"

"Because I like someone else."

I saw her eyebrows scrunch together as she watched her friend. I bit my lip to avoid laughing out loud. This has got to be the funniest thing I've seen in a long time. It was like a sitcom.

"You're not gay, are you?"

I could taste the metallic tang of blood as I tried desperately not to give away my position, my teeth clenched on my lip.

"If I were, I would dress better." I couldn't agree more.

"So who is it then?"

This time, I couldn't hold in my laughter. I coughed loudly to cover it up and I saw the girl freeze before turning around. Her eyes widened as they took me in. I smirked at her as she ran her eyes over me. Her friend took notice of her apparent lapse of interest in their conversation.

"What is it?" He asked, his eyes skimming blankly over me.

The look in her eyes intensified as he stared at her. She didn't turn her attention away from me. I gave her a small wave before standing up and walking casually to the front doors. I let them close behind me and walked out into the empty alley. I leaned back on the grimy brick wall as I waited for her. There was no way her curiosity would allow her to ignore me. I pulled out my sensor and began to tap on some of the symbols engraved in it.

Just like I expected, she burst out through the doors with wide eyes.

"Your friend's poetry is terrible," I commented, before she could even open her mouth, mostly to throw her off.

She blinked at me. "What?"

"I said, his poetry is terrible. It sounds like he ate a dictionary and started vomiting up words at random," I observed.

I could see her fists clench at her sides and her eyes burned in anger. I was honestly a little surprised at her reaction. What did she have to be mad about?

"I don't care about Eric's poetry. I want to know why you're following me," she said angrily.

It clicked then. I may seem to her like I had been stalking her. But really, she showed up to _our_ party. So I only followed her once.

"Who said I was following you?" At this point I knew that I should probably stop goading her on, but it was kind of fun to see her cheeks turn red, almost as red as her fiery hair. Her bright eyes flashed

"_Nice_ try. And you were eavesdropping too. Do you want to tell me what this is about, or should I just call the police?"

"And tell them what? That invisible people are bothering you?" I said sarcastically, looking down at the short girl. "Trust me, little girl, the police aren't going to arrest someone they can't see."

I could see her anger rising. Her jaw was clenched and her fists were shaking slightly.

"I told you before, my name is not little girl, it's Clary," she said between clenched teeth.

"I know," I said. "Pretty name. Like the herb, clary sage. In the old days people thought eating the seeds would let you see the Fair Folk. Did you know that?"

She gave me a deadpan look. "I have no idea what you're talking about."

I wrinkled my nose a little.

"You don't know much, do you? You seem to be a mundane like any other mundane, yet you can see me. It's a conundrum."

"What's a mundane?"

I sighed inwardly. This is going to be a long conversation.

"Someone of the human world. Someone like you," I informed her.

"But _you're_ human," she countered.

"I am, but I'm not like you," I said easily.

She could believe me or not. Either way, she was coming with me back to the institute.

"You think you're better," she accused. "That's why you were laughing at us."

"I was laughing because declarations of love amuse me, especially when unrequited. And because your friend is one of the most mundane mundanes I've ever encountered. And because Hodge thought you might be dangerous, but if you are, you certainly don't know it."

"_I'm _dangerous?" Clary seemed appalled, her eyebrows shooting up. "I saw you kill someone last night. I saw you drive a knife up under his ribs and-" she cut off abruptly.

My lips pressed together. I may be dangerous, that much is right, but she's acting like I would kill anybody who stepped on the back of my shoes.

"I may be a killer, but I know what I am. Can you say the same?" I snapped.

"I'm an ordinary human being, just like you said. Who's Hodge?" I blinked, amazed at how fast she flipped from one topic to the next.

"My tutor. And I wouldn't be so quick to brand myself as ordinary, if I were you. Let me see your right hand," I demanded, leaning towards here a little.

"My right hand?" I nodded. "If I show you my hand will you leave me alone?" she asked warily.

"Certainly," I lied smoothly, trying to hide my amusement.

She reluctantly held her pale hand out to me. I lightly gripped her hand, flipping it over, searching for the familiar black marks.

"Nothing. You're not left-handed, are you?" I asked, hoping she would say yes.

"No. Why?"

I dropped her hand, shrugging. I bit the inside of my cheek, thinking.

"All Shadowhunter children get marked with the Voyance rune on their right hands-or left, if they're left-handed like I am-when they're young. It's a permanent rune that helps us see the magical world," I explained.

I held my left hand out as an example. I was sure she could see it. She could see me, afterall. There's no reason why she shouldn't be able to see my Marks.

"I don't see anything," she said, her expression quizzical.

"Let your mind relax," I instructed. "Wait for it to come to you. Like waiting for something to rise to the surface of water," I told her.

That had been my technique when I was little and faced with strong glamours.

"You're crazy," she stated.

I didn't deny anything.

She had been staring lazily at my hand for about thirty seconds when she suddenly jumped. She blinked and looked up at me, green eyes wide.

"A tattoo?"

I smiled, dropping my hand to my side. "I thought you could do it. And it's not a tattoo-it's a Mark. They're runes, burned into our skin. Different marks do different things. Some are permanent but the majority vanish when they've been used," I explained.

"That's why your arms aren't all inked up today? Even when I concentrate?"

I smiled, proud of our progress. Maybe I should be a teacher.

Yeah right.

"That's exactly why. I knew you had the Sight, at least. It's nearly full dark. We should go," I said, ready for her imminent refusals.

"_We?_ I thought you said you were going to leave me alone," she protested.

"I lied. Hodge said I have to bring you to the Institute with me. He wants to talk to you."

She seemed surprised.

"Why would he want to talk to me?"

"Because you know about us now," I told her.

"About _us?_" she repeated.

I realized that she did that a lot. It made her seem somewhat like a parrot.

"You mean people like you. People who believe in demons," she stated.

"People who kill them," I corrected.

"We're called Shadowhunters. At least, that's what we call ourselves. The Downworlders have less complimentary names for us," I said bitterly.

"Downworlders?" There goes that parrot mentality again.

"The Night Children. Warlocks. The fey. The magical folk of this world," I listed.

She shook her head, a doubting look on her face.

"Don't stop there. I suppose there are also, what, mermaids and werewolves and zombies?" She said scornfully.

I fought the urge to smirk. "Of course there are. There are reasons those stories exist. They're based in fact, even if mundanes think they're myth. Shadowhunters have a saying: _All the stories are true_. Although, to be fair, you mostly find zombies farther south, where _voudun_ priests are," I said.

I switched my weight to my other foot as we stood in the empty alley. I was getting tired of this. It was fun to mess with her but it was losing the thrill.

"What about mummies? Do they only hang around Egypt?"

I scoffed mentally. Mummies weren't part of the Shadow World. Hell, I don't even know where the myth of mummies came from. They were just bodies wrapped in tissue.

"Don't be ridiculous. No one believes in mummies. "

She looked confused.

"They don't?"

"Of course not," I confirmed. "Look, Hodge will explain all this to you when you see him."

The stubborn girl crossed her arms over her chest, her features turning defiant.

"What if I don't want to see him?"

"That's your problem." Not mine. "You can either come willingly or unwillingly." I wished that she would go with me without a fight, but I had orders.

She was going with me either way. Her jaw dropped as she stared at me, her eyes disbelieving.

"Are you threatening to _kidnap_ me?"

I sighed internally. "If you want to look at it that way, yes."

I could see the anger on her face as she opened her mouth to argue.

My ears were saved by a harsh buzzing. She closed her mouth promptly, her face losing some of the scarlet tint.

"Go ahead and answer that if you like," I permitted, knowing it would infuriate her.

The buzzing stopped only to resume again a few seconds later. I was about to offer to answer it for her when she frowned and turned away from me, searching through her bag. When she finally found the device, she placed it to her ear.

"Mom?"

I watched Clary's face as she listened to the other speaker. Her back stiffened as she listened.

"It's all right, Mom. I'm fine," she reassured. "I'm on my way home-"

I was about to contradict her when I saw her face go pale, her eyes widening. It was probably about twenty seconds later when she started to speak again, her voice rising in panic.

"Mom! Mom, are you all right?"

I stepped towards her anxiously. I was only getting half of the conversation but I could only hear a voice from the other end, unable to decipher the words.

"_Who's_ found you? Mom, did you call the police? Did you-" I watched as her face went from pale to completely white, her cheeks losing any color they had previously had.

She had begun to shake slightly, her bright eyes wide with fear and panic.

"_Mom!_ Mom, are you there?" Her voice cut into me like a blade, so full of dread that it hurt.

"Clary, what's going on?" I asked, trying to keep my voice calm for her sake.

She was shaking harder now and she hit the redial button, only to pull it from her ear and hit it again when she received no answer. The thin phone dropped from her fingers and hit the ground. She fell to the ground and picked it up, only to reveal a giant crack in the dark screen. It was somewhat surprising that the phone had broken, given her obvious lack of height.

"Dammit!" she cursed, slamming the device back down to the filthy pavement below.

She was frantic, her eyes gleaming with unshed tears as I grabbed her wrist and pulled her up. "Stop that."

"Has something happened?" I asked, although it was a pretty idiotic question given her reaction to the phone call.

"Give me your phone. I have to-"

"It's not a phone," I cut in when she grabbed my sensor and began to fumble with it. "It's a sensor. You won't be able to use it."

"But I need to call the police!" She cried.

"Tell me what happened first," I demanded, not releasing her wrist when she tugged on it.

"I can _help _you," I growled.

Before I could move, I felt a sharp stinging across the side of my face. I jerked back as she pulled her hand away. She yanked her wrist free and took off before I could get over the shock of the catty gesture. I had been slapped on several occasions but I have never been _clawed_ by a girl before.

With a huff, I grabbed my stele from my belt and burned on a quick _iratze_ before following in the direction she had taken off in. Seventh Avenue, she had been heading towards. I stormed by oblivious mundanes walking down the sidewalks, intent only on catching Clary. My fists were clenched as I felt the scratches on my face begin to fade. She had _scratched _me. Even while I knew I should be mad, I couldn't help but feel pleased at the fact that she had managed to get away from me. She's a fighter.

Just as I turned the corner, I saw a flash of red whip around the one across the road. New York traffic had thankfully slowed her down. Without pause, I rushed into the road, jumping easily over the hood of a taxi cab and reaching the sidewalk in record time. I walked quickly down the path, stopping at the corner to look around. I twisted my mouth the side when I saw no sight of her. I was intent on finding her, but I had absolutely no idea where she had disappeared to. I walked to the next corner before blowing air out of my mouth angrily. Where the _hell_ had she gone?

I waited to cross the road this time before walking down the opposite street. I had been wandering for only a few minutes when I heard a scream pierce the air. My head snapped to a house to my left and I looked up it to see windows lit on the second story. I bypassed a witch's store, making a note to check that out later, before rushing up the stairwell and to a door on the second story. It had been left open and I saw scratches along the outside of it.

"That can't be good," I muttered.

I stepped in warily, a blade ready. I didn't know what was in here and I didn't have my sensor to be alerted of demons.

My eyes widened when I took in the destruction that was the building. I stepped warily into the kitchen, my steps silent. I froze in the doorway, my breathing halting momentarily as I took in the scene laid out before me like something straight out of a horror movie. My eyes were instantly drawn to the dying creatures on the floor.

I saw a Ravener demon, its jaws agape with black fluid dripping from its rotting teeth. I could see a hint of a familiar shape jammed in its throat. My sensor. I watched, stunned as it began to fold in on itself until it disappeared completely. After it was gone, all that lay on the floor was Clary, sprawled out face down on the tiles. Her face was turned away from me, her fiery hair spread out around her head. I observed numbly that the unique color of her hair hid any wounds to her skull, camouflaging any blood.

I saw the wound on the back of her neck where the Ravener must have stung her. It was turning black, the fatal poison being carried into her bloodstream. Finally, I snapped out of my frozen stupor, wanting to kick myself. Since when did I freeze up like that?

"Clary?" I called, not really expecting the unconscious girl to awaken.

I wasn't surprised when she stayed perfectly still. I pressed two fingers firmly against the veins on her wrist, feeling relief wash over me when I felt her weak pulse. I stood up and reluctantly left her side, taking one more look around the small home before rushing back to her side. I didn't want any surprises when I wouldn't be able to reach a weapon. I slid the knife I had been holding back into the cuff on wrist and gently flipped her over, causing her head to loll to the side like a doll. Her face was paler than it had been before and she seemed so much weaker, more fragile now. Her eyelashes were dark half-moons set in her freckled cheeks. They weren't full or long like Isabelle's, but they still cast a shadow that made her look more innocent than she had the only other times I had ever seen her.

I slid my arms under her and lifted her smoothly off the ground. I got to my feet, holding her securely against me. I turned, watching my surroundings warily while I started out the door. I jogged quickly down the stairs, trying my best not to jostle the injured girl in my arms too much.

I ran into no other living creatures as I made my way outside. I heard police sirens becoming louder by the second and cursed quietly before jogging carefully around to the back of the building. When I was out of sight of the street, I set Clary down gently on the damp grass. I peered around the side of the building, making sure nobody had seen us before kneeling down beside the dying girl.

I pulled out some bandages I had placed in my belt and began tearing it into strips, ready to place them over the wound on her neck. It must have stung her after she shoved my sensor down its throat. I felt a burst of misplaced pride at the thought that she had killed the thing without an ounce of training. I had no reason to be proud of the girl, but I did regardless.

I heard the sirens wail louder and louder, piercing my ears with their high pitch. I saw the telltale flashing red and blue lights appear and grimaced. I heard a sound like choking and looked down to see that Clary had opened her eyes, looking up at the stars with confusion etched into her pale features.

"Don't move," I warned her sternly.

From the corner of my eye, I saw her turn her head to the side and wince at the pain. I resisted the urge to snap at her. I saw some nosy neighbors already gathering as two police officers stepped out of the car they had parked on the side of the road. I saw Clary catch sight of the blue-clad officials and she tried to lift herself up, only to gag and fall back. I saw her fingers sink into the damp earth below her. Her hands were small, the skin smooth, her nails squared off. Her hands were the hands of an artist, not the hands of a warrior like mine.

"I told you not to move," I chastised snappily. "That Ravener demon got you in the back of the neck. It was half-dead so it wasn't much of a sting, but we have to get you to the Institute. Hold still," I warned again.

"That thing-the monster-it _talked_," she babbled, her body shaking.

"You've heard a demon talk before," I said calmly.

I took the strip of cloth I had covered with salve and tied it around her neck. The salve would help draw the poison out of her system, although she would still definitely need more treatment. I felt her shuddering when I tied the makeshift bandage up.

"The demon in Pandemonium," she began. "It looked like a person." I could almost hear her silent-_this one didn't_.

"It was an Eidolon demon. A shape-changer," I said, feeling like a teacher once again.

Even in the midst of her dying, she still continued to be plagued by curiosity. Then again, she probably didn't know she would die without help. She continued to shake and it made it hard to get the knot tied.

"Raveners look like they look. Not very attractive, but they're too stupid to care," I finished.

"It said it was going to eat me," she said with another shake.

"But it didn't," I soother her. "You killed it." Is that soothing to a mundie?

It would be to me if I was injured. To know that at least the thing I had been fighting was dead. But she's so different from Shadowhunters. I thankfully finished the knot and I saw the relief in her eyes when the pain began to dissipate. She forced herself up into an upright position and I resisted the urge to help her.

"The police are here. We should-"

"There's nothing they can do," I cut her off.

What is with mundies and the trust they put in officials?

"Somebody probably heard you screaming and reported it. Ten to one those aren't real police officers. Demons have a way of hiding their tracks," I told her, looking up to make sure nobody had wandered back here.

Although they probably wouldn't see me, the sight of a sick girl sitting alone, talking to nobody would probably warrant some concern from the neighbors. But hell, this was New York City. Maybe nobody would find it odd at all.

"My mom," she said suddenly.

I shook my head, understanding what she wanted. There was no time to look for her. There was no time for anything really. I had wasted enough time. I needed to get her back to the Institute where Hodge could help her.

"There's Ravener poison coursing through your veins _right now_," I said urgently. "You'll be dead in an hour if you don't come with me." I stood up, leaving her no option to argue.

I offered her a hand, looking down at her and hoping she would take it. A few seconds later she placed her small hand in mine. Her skin was soft and smooth against my rough skin. I pulled her up quickly, watching warily as she tilted unsteadily on her feet. "Come on."

I placed my hand on her back when she began to tip to the side. I smelt her hair as she leaned a little against me. She smelled like a mixture of strawberries and blood now, although I assumed that she didn't usually smell like blood.

"Can you walk?"

"I think so," she replied, looking around our surroundings.

She watched the police officer walking up the path towards her front door. She was wearing the glamour of a pretty young blonde, but I could see the skeletal face underneath. A Du'sien demon. She held a flashlight, although I knew it was just for appearances. Du'sien demons had perfect night vision, just like most species of demons.

"Her hand-" Clary gasped, drawing my attention.

"I told you they might be demons. We have to get out of here. Can we go through the alley?" I asked, looking around for a way out that wouldn't cause a run in with neighbors or fake police officers.

Clary shook her head in response. "It's bricked up. There's no way-" she cut herself off abruptly as she began to cough, loud enough that I was worried she would draw attention.

I grimaced, knowing that it wasn't a good sign. I saw her pull her hand from her mouth and heard her whine weakly. I saw the dark liquid that was on her hand when she dropped it and understood why she had whimpered. I was running out of time. I needed to buy myself some time to get her to the Institute.

I grabbed her wrist and flipped it so that her palm faced the stars. I saw her legs began to give out and made a quick decision. She could see me. What were the odds that she was just a simple mundie? Especially after she killed a demon without any training.

No, she can't be just a mundie. She had to have Shadowhunter blood. I didn't let her pull her arm away. She had no choice. Either she let me put a mark on her or she died. And since she didn't understand that, I would make the choice for her. I just hoped to the angel that I wasn't wrong. I let go of her arm and she pulled it away, looking down at the mark I had placed on her arm.

"What's that supposed to do?" She asked weakly.

"It'll hide you," I responded. "Temporarily."

I slipped my stele back into my belt and noticed her watching me curiously.

"My stele," I told her.

To my surprise, she didn't ask me what a stele did or what it was, or what it was made of, or how much it cost. I had expected at least one question, but she seemed disoriented. I saw her stumble and reached out to steady her.

"Jace," she whispered, before she fell limply into my arms.

My name on her lips made my heart pound harder in my chest. I could see that she was still conscious, although not totally aware. I sighed.

"I've already broken the covenant once tonight, why not twice?"

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**I hope you liked this chapter :) **

**So, I have a question. I have chapter one of City of Ashes from Jace's point of view written. Would anybody read it if I posted it?**

**If you want me to write the CoA from his POV let e know in a review.**


	3. Chapter 3

**Here's chapter 3 :) Thank you guys for all the reviews I've received, they always make my day :)**

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It was chaos when I brought her back. The whole first day she was in the infirmary I was hounded by the Institute's other residents-just Alec, Isabelle, and Hodge really. They wanted to know every detail about what happened. It wasn't until the next day that I was left alone. I didn't go to see her after I left her in Hodge's care. There was a large chance she wouldn't make it and the chances of her making it through grew slimmer every day her eyes remain closed. I didn't want to see her if the next time I did she was going to be a body. It would be easier just to forget and move on without getting attached.

It was just too bad that it was too late to not be attached. If I was being honest with myself, the first time I saw the fiery girl I was attached. I couldn't help it. I dreamt about her the first night she was here and the night after that. I dreamt about holding her, being around her, kissing her.

How I wished she would wake up. Oh, I wished every second I breathed, but I didn't dare to hope. If I hoped, and she died, I would be disappointed and I didn't want to deal with the heartbreak of hopes being crushed. But however I held back my hopes, I couldn't stop the dreams of her. It was on the third day that I realized that the girl was destroying me. And she wasn't even conscious. We hadn't even really had a full discussion without being interrupted in one way or another. I barely knew her and she was tearing me apart.

It was so unlike me, to allow a girl to get to me like this. And I didn't even know her full name. Or how old she was. That thought froze me in my tracks. I must have looked like a fool, frozen in the middle of the hallway. I shook my head and turned into the music room. Maybe playing the piano would be able to distract me.

I managed to stop thinking about her for probably half an hour while I lost myself in the music I was playing. I was snapped out of it by a sound. I heard something move near the doorway. It was shadowed and I couldn't see who it was.

"Alec? Is that you?" I called.

"It's not Alec, it's me. Clary." She stepped forward into the room and I saw her clearly now.

My fingers were frozen on the keys. She was alive. As soon as my brain got over that little fact, I realized that if I stayed silent any longer she would think that I was brain dead. So I stood smoothly, bumping the piano slightly with my hip.

"Our own Sleeping Beauty. Who finally kissed you awake?"

"Nobody. I woke up on my own," she replied, her mouth twisting to the side.

"Was there anybody with you?" I asked, hoping that she hadn't just _left_.

That would cause some trouble if nobody even knew she was awake.

"Isabelle, but she went off to get someone-Hodge I think. She told me to wait, but-"

"I should have warned her about your habit of never doing what you're told," I commented, taking in her appearance.

I saw that the clothes couldn't be hers. They were too big on her, not as tight as I knew they would be on somebody who they fit on. She wore dark jeans which she had rolled up so that they didn't drag on the ground with a blood red tank top. The shirt was seriously low-cut. I had to force myself not to focus on that particular part of her wardrobe.

"Are those Isabelle's clothes? They look ridiculous on you," I commented, only half truthfully.

"I could point out that you burned _my_ clothes," she shot back with a glare.

I hid a smirk, looking down to slide the piano cover down.

"It was purely precautionary. Come on, I'll take you to Hodge."

I saw her face scrunch up at my response about her clothing and bit my lip to keep from laughing. I led her out of the room, not checking to make sure she was following me. I could hear her loud steps and twisted my mouth to the side. She had definitely been raised a mundane. Shadowhunters walk silently, not with loud, clonking footsteps. She moved up beside me when we reached the hall and I saw her looking around in wonder, her eyes widened in marvel. I felt myself smiling as I watched her and wiped the expression from my face before she could see it.

We walked down the empty halls, passing half-opened doors revealing empty rooms. Her footsteps echoed along in the silence. I looked ahead of me when she turned to look at me.

"Why does this place have so many bedrooms? I thought it was a research institute," she commented, peering into one of the bare rooms.

"This is the residential wing," I answered. "We're pledged to offer safety and lodging to any Shadowhunter who requests it. We can house up to two-hundred people here."

"But most of these rooms are empty."

I bit my tongue to keep in a sarcastic remark, not wanting to upset her. I had trouble trying to remember the last time I had bit back a harsh comment just because I didn't want to upset someone.

"People come and go," I said instead. "Nobody stays for long. Usually it's just us-Alec, Isabelle, Max, their parents- and me and Hodge."

"Max?" she questioned.

I shouldn't have expected anything less than an interrogation when I started satisfying her curiosity.

"You met the beauteous Isabelle? Alec is her older brother. Max is the youngest, but he's overseas with his parents," I supplied, thinking fondly of the little boy and his books.

Hodge kept him entertained for hours in the library, getting him book after book to read.

"On vacation?"

She was watching me now, although she was trying to be subtle. If I had been someone like the boy she had been at the coffee house with, I probably wouldn't have noticed.

"Not exactly," I said, uncertainly.

How could I put this that she would understand? I had a brief flicker of doubt-should I be telling her all these things? We had no idea who she was and I was spilling everything about us. I shrugged that off mentally. She had Shadowhunter blood. She could be trusted to hold the secrets of the Shadow world.

"You can think of them as –as foreign diplomats, and of this as an embassy, of sorts," I said, pulling on my limited knowledge of mundane governments. "Right now they're in the Shadowhunter home country, working out some very delicate peace negotiations. They brought Max with them because he's so young."

"Shadowhunter home country?" she fired back immediately. "What's it called?"

"Idris," I replied, thinking of the beautiful city of Alicante with its glass building and sparkling towers.

"I've never heard of it."

I huffed a little, quietly. "You wouldn't have. Mundanes don't know about it. There are wardings-protective spells-up all over the borders. If you tried to cross into Idris, you'd simply be transported instantly from one border to the next. You'd never know what happened."

"So it's not on any maps?" She asked, her eyes still on me.

"Not mundie ones. For our purposes you can consider it a small country between Germany and France," I explained, hoping that it would help her understand better.

"But there isn't anything between Germany and France. Except Switzerland," she said, her eyebrows furrowing together.

"Precisely."

She huffed a bit and I wondered with a feeling of accomplishment if I was annoying her.

"I take it you've been there. To Idris, I mean," she clarified, although I already knew what she meant.

My mind doesn't seem to wander as much as hers does. She seems to flit from one topic to the next easily, while I try to focus on one thing at a time.

"I grew up there," I said, trying to convey in my tone that I didn't want to continue on that subject.

My childhood isn't exactly my favorite topic and I didn't want to change the mood on the conversation. So I continued to speak of Idris instead.

"Most of us do. There are, of course, Shadowhunters all over the world. We have to be everywhere, because demonic activity is everywhere. But to a Shadowhunter, Idris is always 'home'," I said.

"Like Mecca or Jerusalem," she commented.

I blinked quickly. It amazed me how she could take all of that and apply it to what she already knew of the world. But she seemed to understand the concept, so I let it be, even though Idris isn't a religious place.

"So most of you are brought up there, and then when you grow up-"

"We're sent where we're needed," I finished. "And there are a few, like Isabelle and Alec, who grew up away from the home country because that's where their parents are. With all of the resources of the Institute here, with Hodge's training-this is the library."

I looked down at her while she admired the ornate doors. I saw Church, the Institute's lazy, blue Persian, lying at the doors. He picked his head up off his paws and stared at us before yowling loudly. I saw Clary staring at it oddly. I guess she's never seen a blue cat before.

"Hey, Church." I used my foot to pet the lazy beast, watching its eyes slit as I did.

"Wait, Alec and Isabelle and Max-they're the only Shadowhunters your age that you know, that you spend time with?" Her voice was incredulous and it confused me for a moment, my foot moving away from the cat.

"Yes."

"That must get kind of lonely," she said thoughtfully.

I saw her look at me out of the corner of her eye, trying to be discreet. I almost smiled, watching her try to be sneaky.

"I have everything I need," I said simply. I pushed the doors open and stepped into the familiar room.

She followed behind me and I slowed to let her go ahead. I watched her as she took in her surroundings. Her eyes were wide in awe as she looked at the shelves, high enough up that ladders were necessary to reach the higher-up volumes. The books were all carefully placed according to no obvious order. Hodge seemed to know where everything was, so I had no doubt that there was _some kind_ of a system in place. The only question was what exactly that system was. I knew shapeshifters were in one part, demons in another, although I was also aware that books on Eidolons, shape-shifting demons, could be found in both and in several other places. It was all really pretty crazy.

I noticed Clary staring curiously at the floor, the tiny bits of gems, stones, glass, marble, and even some _adamas_ mixed in. I remembered the first time I had stepped foot in the library, asking Hodge what the stones shaped. He told me that I was welcome to climb higher in the tower and find out. So I did. The first time I had seen the mosaic of the angel Raziel. I had known immediately who it was, every Shadowhunter above the age of three knew who Raziel was and they had seen the image of him rising up from the water, holding the mortal instruments that would be used to protect man-kind.

I looked over to see Alec sprawled lazily in an armchair near the empty fireplace. I saw her eyes stop moving around so much when she located Hodge's form behind his large desk.

"A book lover, I see," he said, smiling at Clary. "You didn't tell me that, Jace."

I chuckled, letting my face relax into a grin. "We haven't done much talking in our short acquaintance. I'm afraid our reading habits didn't come up."

I was glad though, that she enjoyed books. Hodge could read people well, and I didn't doubt that he was correct about her. Clary turned around to glare at me and I just grinned back, finding it cute when she tried to be scary.

"How can you tell? That I like books, I mean," she asked, looking to Hodge again.

"The look on your face when you walked in. Somehow I doubted that you were that impressed by _me_," Hodge answered with a smile. He began to get up, walking towards us around his desk. I heard Clary's muffled gasp as she took him in. I knew how intimidating it was to see Hodge for the first time, that damned bird always perched on his shoulder.

Her eyes were wide as she stared at Hugo, Hodge's bird.

"This is Hugo," Hodge introduced, his hand brushing against the bird. "Hugo is a raven, and, as such, he knows many things. I, meanwhile, am Hodge Starkweather, a professor of history, and, as such, I do not know nearly enough."

Clary laughed, to my surprise, and shook his hand. "Clary Fray," she introduced.

"Honored to make your acquaintance," he began with a warm smile. "I would be honored to make the acquaintance of anyone who could kill a Ravener with her bare hands."

I saw an odd look come over her face, as though she found what he'd said to be strange. Thinking on it, I realized that to her it would be strange. She was being prided because she killed something she hadn't even known to exist a few days ago. I guess the closest mundanes got to being congratulated for killing things was when they hunted deer.

"It wasn't my bare hands. It was Jace's-well, I don't remember what it was called, but-"

"She means my sensor," I clarified. "She shoved it down the thing's throat. The runes must have choked it." A second later, I realized that I was no longer the owner of a sensor. "I guess I'll need another one. I should have mentioned that."

"There are several extra in the weapons room." He smiled again at Clary, the lines around his eyes flashing into view, reminding me of his age. "That was quick thinking. What gave you the idea of using the sensor as a weapon?"

I could see on her face that she didn't have an answer. She must've just…done it. Probably instinct, her last shot to not get eaten like a turkey dinner. I was about to cut in, to save her from saying that, when I heard a sharp laugh from Alec's direction. I saw Clary jump. She had clearly overlooked him when she walked in.

"I can't believe you buy that story, Hodge," he said bitterly.

Clary didn't look offended at first, she just stared at him for a moment, taking in his appearance. I felt a wave of jealousy-an unfamiliar emotion for me-as her eyes moved over him. I looked at him as well, noticing how he scowled at Clary, as though she had just spit on his shoes. His bright blue eyes blazed with indignation.

"I'm not quite sure what you mean, Alec. Are you suggesting that she didn't kill that demon after all?" Hodge's voice was still kind, although I could detect a faint hint of sharpness to it. Clary still didn't seem fazed, she turned now to look at Hodge. I could tell that her eyes were resting on the scar across his face. I, however, felt offended for her. How could he question the fact that she had killed the damn thing?

"Of course she didn't. Look at her-she's a mundie, Hodge, and a little kid, at that. There's no way she took on a Ravener," Alec nearly spat. Now, I saw her face harden, her fists clench a little at her sides and her shoulders tense.

"I'm not a little kid. I'm sixteen years old- well, I will be on Sunday," she argued angrily. _Ah, _I thought then. She always got offended when I called her little girl, and now she was offended about being called a little kid. I could understand it, her dislike of being treated like a child. Shadowhunters were considered children until they were eighteen. There was just something about her that seemed so young, so naïve.

"The same age as Isabelle. Would you call her a child?" Hodge countered, looking pointedly at Alec.

Alec looked offended. Was anyone in this room _not_ offended at this point?

"Isabelle hails from one of the greatest Shadowhunter dynasties in history. This girl, on the other hand, hails from New Jersey."

"I'm from Brooklyn! And so what? I just killed a demon in my own house, and you're going to be a dickhead about it because I'm not some spoiled-rotten rich brat like you and your sister?"

She was clearly furious; her cheeks taking on a red that nearly rivaled her hair. I was a little stunned at her outburst. Although she had unleashed her temper on me before-whenever I called her little girl for one-she always seemed so timid and calm before she suddenly snapped. A hothead, fitting, considering the fiery color of her hair. I could almost imagine it being actual flames instead of hair, fueling her short temper.

"_What_ did you call me?" Alec asked, his face completely stunned.

I let my laughter out, his face too much for me. "She had a point, Alec. It's those bridge-and-tunnel demons you really have to watch out for-"

"It's not _funny_, Jace," Alec spat, cutting me off. He stood up swiftly, his hands clenched into fists as tight as Clary's already were. "Are you going to stand there and let her call me names?" I had to bite my lip hard enough that I tasted blood to keep from laughing out loud. He sounded like a clingy girlfriend.

"Yes," I said. "It'll do you good-try to think of it as endurance training."

"We may be _Parabatai, _but your flippancy is wearing on my patience," he snapped, his eyes like daggers as he glared at me.

I narrowed my eyes, all humor dissipating. He had begun to piss me off.

"And your obstinacy is wearing on mine. When I found her, she was lying on the floor in a pool of blood with a dying demon practically on top of her. I watched as it vanished. If she didn't kill it, who did?"

"Raveners are stupid," Alec fired back. "Maybe it got itself in the back of the neck with its stinger. It's happened before-" I couldn't believe he was still trying to argue this.

"Now you're suggesting it committed suicide?"

Alec's lips were pressed tight. "It isn't right for her to be here. Mundies aren't allowed in the Institute, and there are good reasons for that. If anyone knew about this, we could be reported to the Clave."

It didn't get by me how quickly he changed tactics, trying to make Clary the bad guy no matter what.

"That's not entirely true," Hodge argued. "The Law does allow us to offer sanctuary to mundanes in certain circumstances. A Ravener has already attacked Clary's mother-she could well have been next."

I saw Clary's face go pale at his words. Her eyes glazed over a bit, as though she was far away. Her fists had unclenched already and I saw her shoulders drop a little, as though all the anger had left her, leaving only exhaustion.

"Raveners are search-and-destroy machines," Alec pointed out. "They act under orders from warlocks or powerful demon lords. Now, what interest would a warlock or demon lord have with a mundane household?" He looked at Clary, and I didn't like how cruelly he was treating her. It's not like she had asked for this. "Any thoughts?"

"It could have been a mistake," she said weakly.

"Demons don't make those kind of mistakes If they went after your mother, there must have been a reason. If she were innocent-"

"What do you mean, 'innocent'?" Her voice was scarily quiet. I couldn't tell if she was trying to hide her anger, or if she just was tired of all this.

Alec blinked, confused. "I-"

"What he means, is that it is extremely unusual for a powerful demon, the kind who might command a host of lesser demons, to interest himself in the affairs of human beings. No mundane may summon a demon-they lack that power-but there have been some, desperate and foolish, who have found a witch or warlock to do it for them."

"My mother doesn't know any warlocks. She doesn't believe in magic." Her face suddenly lit up. "Madame Dorothea-she lives downstairs-she's a witch. Maybe the demons were after her and got my mom by mistake?"

Hodge looked shocked. "A witch lives downstairs from you?"

"She's a hedge-witch—a fake. I already looked into it. There's no reason for any warlock to be interested in her unless he's in the market for non-functional crystal balls." I thought back to how I had waited until the woman left her shop to sneak in and check her place out. Everything was fake, nothing that would concern the Shadow world or Downworld.

"And we're back where we began." Hodge sighed, reaching up to stroke Hugo's sleek feathers. "It seems the time has come to notify the Clave."

"No!" I cried. If he notified the Clave, they would take her, probably to Idris or the Silent City. She would be forced to comply to their tests and interrogations. They wouldn't treat her the way they should a shell-shocked, frightened mundane girl. "We can't-"

"It made sense to keep Clary's presence here a secret while we were not sure she would recover. But now she has, and she is the first mundane to pass through the doors of the Institute in over a hundred years. You know the rules about mundane knowledge of the Shadowhunters, Jace. The Clave must be informed."

"Absolutely," Alec said quickly. "I could get a message to my father-"

"She's not a mundane," I finally admitted.

I knew that I was going to catch some serious hell for this, but I couldn't let her be handed over to the Clave. Everyone went silent. Only Hugo made a noise, his feathers ruffling.

"But I am," Clary retorted finally, looking at me with furrowed eyebrows.

"No. You aren't." I bit back my nervousness, swallowing thickly. Hodge was going to kill me. Forget dying in battle, I was going to be beat to death with a book by my angry instructor.

"That night—there were Du'sien demons, dressed like police officers. We had to get past them. Clary was too weak to run, and there wasn't time to hide—she would have died. So I used my stele—put a _mendelin _rune on the inside of her arm. I thought—"

"Are you out of your _mind_?" Hodge yelled suddenly. He slammed his hand down on his desk and I saw Clary jump a little. "You know what the Law says about placing marks on mundanes! You—you of all people ought to know better!"

"But it worked," I argued. "Clary, show them your arm," I ordered. She shot me a confused look but did as I asked. I saw Hodge's eyes zero in on the overlapping circles, faded away to nearly invisible white lines now. "See, it's almost gone," I said, hoping I was convincing them. "It didn't hurt her at all."

"That's not the point," Hodge said. I could see that he was seething, although he held himself together well. I wondered briefly if it was just because Clary was here or if he would've tried to control his anger anyway. "You could have turned her into a Forsaken."

Alec's face was flushed with anger as he stared at me. "I can't believe you, Jace. Only Shadowhunters can receive Covenant Marks—they'll _kill_ mundanes—" I bit back the first thing that came to my mind, only to keep from scaring Clary. I wanted to point out that had I done nothing, she would've died anyway.

"She's not a mundane. Haven't you been listening?" I asked, exasperated. "It explains why she could see us. She must have Clave blood."

Clary just then lowered her arm, as if she had forgotten she was holding it up.

"But I don't, I couldn't," she argued, her head shaking ever so slightly.

"You must," I said, my words tumbling out. I had to convince them. I had to convince her. I wanted her to be one of us, although I couldn't have said why. "If you didn't, that Mark I made on your arm…"

"That's enough, Jace," Hodge cut in, disapproval leaking into his tone. "There's no need to frighten her further."

It was only then that I noticed that her green eyes were wide with shock and I felt guilty, knowing I had been seconds from scaring her completely away from us.

"But I was right, wasn't I?" I asked, unable to help from arguing further. "It explains what happened to her mother, too. If she was a Shadowhunter in exile, she might well have Downworlder enemies."

"My mother wasn't a Shadowhunter!" Clary snapped at me, glaring now.

"Your father then," I compromised. "What about hum?"

She gave me a look, her eyes devoid of any emotion. Her voice was flat when she responded. "He died before I was born."

I flinched a little. _Smooth, _I thought bitterly.

"It's possible," Alec said finally. "If her father were a Shadowhunter, and her mother a mundane—well, we all know it's against the Law to marry a mundie. Maybe they were in hiding," he suggested, grudgingly.

"My mother would have told me," Clary denied, although I heard the doubt in her statement even as it left her lips.

"Not necessarily. We all have our secrets."

"Luke," Clary said suddenly, her eyes lighting up. "Our friend. He would know." This time there was not an ounce of doubt in her voice, only confidence in this family friend.

"It's been three days—he must be frantic. Can I call him? Is there a phone?" She turned to face me suddenly and I immediately felt overwhelmed by the pleading look she gave me. "Please."

I looked at Hodge. He nodded and moved out of the way of his desk, revealing the brass globe which marked Idris as one of its countries. Beside it was the old phone he kept. Clary went over to it quickly, putting the hearing piece to her ear and quickly punching in a memorized number. Her shoulders were tense and I moved over subtly so that I could see her face. Her expression was a mixture of expectance and hope. From where I stood, I couldn't hear the other side of the conversation so I moved over to the armchair that Alec had previously inhabited. I leaned against it, listening to her half of the conversation.

"Luke!" her shoulders slumped with relief, and she leaned heavily against the wooden desk. "It's me. It's Clary."

"I'm fine. I'm sorry I didn't call you before. Luke, my mom—"

She seemed to deflate a little then.

"Then you haven't heard from her. What did that police say?"

"I'm in the city. I don't know where exactly. With some friends. My wallet's gone, though. If you've got some cash, I could take a cab to your place—"

I tensed, even as she paused, clearly cut off. The phone slipped suddenly from her hand and almost hit the floor. Whatever Luke was saying, it couldn't be good.

"What?" It hurt to hear the pain and shock in her voice. There was a long pause before she replied, her voice turning a little whiny.

"But I don't want to stay here. I don't know these people. You—"

"I'm sorry. It's just—"

She remained silent for a moment before frantically redialing the number. After a few moments, she slammed the phone down. I saw her shaking, biting her lip.

"I take it he wasn't happy to hear from you?" As she turned to face us again, I regretted my words instantly. Her face made her look like a girl who had just lost everything, and hell, it seems like she pretty much has. She had been counting on that Luke, and he had clearly just turned her away, abandoning her. I felt an intense dislike for the man, seeing how pale her face was. Her hands were trembling and I saw that she was biting her lower lip, blinking repetitively.

"I think I'd like to have a talk with Clary," Hodge said. "Alone."

I blinked in shock as Alec stood up. "Fine. We'll leave you to it," he said. I was a little insulted by Hodge's actions. I had saved her life!

"That's hardly fair," I argued hotly. "I'm the one who found her. I'm the one who saved her life! You want me here, don't you?" I asked, turning to face Clary.

I saw how shiny her eyes were and she swallowed tightly, as I knew people did when they were trying to hold tears back. She looked away from me, not answering. Alec laughed and I felt suddenly like punching my _parabatai_.

"Not everyone wants you all the time, Jace."

"Don't be ridiculous," I said, trying to veil the displeasure in my tone. "Fine, then. We'll be in the weapons room."

I turned sharply, walking briskly over to the library doors. Alec and I walked side-by-side down the empty hallways.

"Mundanes are such crybabies," he said suddenly. I scoffed at him.

"What the hell is with you, today? You're treating Clary like she's got an infectious disease," I said, turning to confront him.

He glared at me. "She's a _mundane_, Jace. Why does her business matter so much to you?"

I rolled my eyes skyward. "We just went over this," I said through clenched teeth. "She. Is. Not. A. Mundane."

"Maybe not, but you're doting on her like she the queen of fu-"

"Fight nice, boys." I turned my head to see Isabelle coming down the hallway. She looked between us, taking in Alec's clenched fists and reddening face. She raised an eyebrow.

"What is going on?"

Alec and I stared at each other for a minute, not answering.

"Come on, guys. Pull yourselves together. Figure it out and get over it. I'm going to go finish dinner," she announced before brushing by us and leaving.

"Oh Angel save us," I moaned. Alec laughed lightly and shook his head at me. I grinned crookedly, slapping him on his back.

"Come on. We've got seraph blades to work on."

* * *

**Hope you guys enjoyed this one :)**

**Don't forget to review! **

**-Cassidy**


	4. Chapter 4

**Here's the fourth chapter. I hope you enjoy :)**

* * *

We had been working on the seraph blades for a decent amount of time when I heard the door open and footsteps echo in. Clary.

I looked up at her as she entered. "Where's Hodge?"

"Writing to the Silent Brothers."

I looked her over, noticing that she looked much better now than she had when we left her with Hodge. Color had returned to her face and she was no longer shaking or holding back tears.

"Ugh," Alec uttered, shuddering a little.

She walked over slowly, watching Alec nervously. I bit back a laugh. She looked like she was waiting for him to reach out and stab her. Then I narrowed my eyes, watching him. Maybe that wasn't so far-fetched.

"What are you doing?"

"Putting the last touches on these." I moved out of the way, giving her a view the glowing blades. "Sanvi, Sansavi, and Semangelaf. They're seraph blades."

Her head tilted to the side slightly when she looked at them, and I saw on her face that she had more questions. It was good to see her curiosity returning.

"Those don't look like knives. How did you make them? Magic?" she guessed.

I raised a brow. Magic?

"The funny thing about mundies," I observed, talking to anyone who wanted to listen. "is how obsessed they are with magic for a bunch of people who don't even know what it means."

"I know what it means," Clary said sharply.

"No, you don't. You just think you do," I said absently. "Magic is a dark and elemental force, not just a lot of sparkly wands and crystal balls, and talking goldfish."

"I never said it was a lot of talking goldfish you—"

I waved a hand, effectively silencing her argument.

"Just because you call an electric eel a rubber duck doesn't make it a rubber duck, does it? And god help the poor bastard who decides they want to take a bath with the duckie."

Clary blinked at me.

"You're driveling." I furrowed my brows.

"I'm not."

"Yes, you are," Alec said, shocking me. "Look, we don't do magic, okay? That's all you need to know about it."

Clary's next words shocked me, causing me to almost lose my grip on the blade. "Hodge said I can go home." I saw Alec's eyes light up, as though he had been waiting to hear that.

"_He said what_?"

"To look through my mother's things," she clarified then, allowing my breathing to return to normal. "If you go with me."

"Jace," Alec said.

"If you really want to prove that my mom or dad was a Shadowhunter, we should look through my mom's things. What's left of them," she added sadly.

"Down the rabbit hole," I said, shooting her a grin. "Good idea. If we go right now, we should have another three, four hours of daylight."

"Do you want me to come with you?" Alec asked. I shook my head, walking to the door.

"No. That's all right. Clary and I can handle this on our own," I said.

There was no need to subject her to even more dirty looks while she was going through the ruins of her home.

I walked down the hall quickly, guiding myself through the familiar hallways.

"Have you got your house keys?" I checked, looking at her to the side.

"Yeah."

"Good. Not that we couldn't break in, but we'd run a greater chance of disturbing any wards that might be up if we did." I wondered if I should warn her that she might not like what she found. But that thought quickly evaporated. There was no way she didn't already know that what she found wouldn't be good. It was pretty clear, you know, since there was a demon there the last time she had visited.

"If you say so," she said simply.

We were silent for a while. We had just approached the old, rickety elevator when she said my name.

"Jace?"

"Yeah?" I looked at her from the corner of my eye. She appeared to be lost in thought, her eyes far away as we stepped onto the elevator.

"How did you know I had Shadowhunter blood? Was there some way you could tell?" She looked at me with curiosity sparkling in her green eyes.

"I guessed," I admitted, feeling the familiar mixture of guilt and relief that I received whenever I thought of my actions that night. Guilt, for putting her life in danger like that, and relief, from when I realized that I hadn't killed her.

She looked around the elevator warily, as though waiting for it to collapse around us. Her lips were parted a little in wonder at her elaborately decorated surroundings. As my eyes landed on her lips, all I could think of was kissing her. I was shocked at my reaction. I had never felt such a strong desire to just _kiss_ a girl. I looked away, deciding that I just needed to stop _seeing_ her.

"You guessed?" she asked skeptically. "You must have been pretty sure, considering you could have killed me."

I pressed the down button, my mind racing for a reply. I wouldn't lie; I wasn't one hundred percent sure when I put that Mark on her that she would receive it well. But I had been pretty sure. Did that count as close enough to say I was sure?

"I was ninety percent sure."

There was a pause for a moment, and I almost thought that she wasn't going to say anything, that my answer had been satisfactory.

"I see," she finally said. Her voice was flat and hard, making it impossible to detect any emotions. I looked at her in confusion.

Before I could even process her expression, a sharp stinging erupted on the side of my face. I tipped back slightly in shock, putting my hand on the place where her hand had just connected. It hadn't really hurt, but it had taken me completely by surprise. It was nothing that hadn't happened before, but it had never been so unsuspected before. I saw the anger in her eyes, the hard set to her jaw.

"What the hell was that for?" I asked angrily.

"The other ten percent."

I took one look at her face and I knew I should be angry, insulted, and maybe even—if I were a mundane—pained. But as I took in the hard line her lips were pressed into, all I could think about was that she would never let me kiss her now.

We were silent, not a word spoken between us to break the tension. I knew she was angry, and I was too. But by the time we were halfway through the train ride to Brooklyn, I would have pushed that aside just to hear her say _something_. Since I had met her, the only time she had been this quiet for this long was when she was unconscious. I longed to say something to break the silence, but I didn't know what to say. For the first time since I could remember, I couldn't figure out a single damn thing to say.

When I snuck looks over at the redhead, I could see that her anger was waning, and she seemed to, again, be lost in thought. She looked as if she was deep in her own mind. I looked away, not wanting to be caught staring.

I saw her turn out of the corner of my eye. She was staring at me, not really inconspicuously at all. Her green eyes were flickering over my face and I turned to look at her. She didn't seem to notice at first, still looking me over. When she did, she blinked quickly and I saw a scarlet blush rise to her cheeks.

"Can I help you with something?" I asked, mostly to be an ass. I raised an eyebrow.

"Those girls on the other side of the car are staring at you," she said quickly.

_So are you_. I grinned cockily. I wasn't an idiot. I knew what affect my appearance had on girls, especially mundanes.

"Of course they are. I am stunningly attractive." I saw her response was an effort not to roll her eyes.

"Haven't you heard that modestly is an attractive trait?"

"Only from ugly people," I responded easily. "The meek may inherit the earth, but at the moment it belongs to the conceited. Like me," I said, shooting a wink at the blondes across the car. I had noticed them and their obvious staring minutes after we stepped onto the train.

The girl beside me just sighed, clearly giving up on her argument. "How come they can see you?"

I shrugged lightly. "Glamours are a pain to use. Sometimes we don't bother," I confided.

I was in a much better mood when we stepped from the train. It was a combination of messing with those girls and actually speaking to Clary again that had raised my spirits. I hummed to myself as we walked, flipping one of the seraph blades, Sanvi, around in my fingers.

"Do you have to do that?" Clary asked irritably. "It's annoying."

I hummed louder, just to bug her. It was too easy to get under her skin and I couldn't help but try.

"I'm sorry I smacked you," she finally said.

I stopped humming then, pausing to think. "Just be glad you hit me and not Alec. He would have hit you back." I grimaced a little at the visual, before shaking it out of my head.

"He seems to be itching for the chance," she muttered bitterly. I saw her kick a soda can out of her path , her eyes on the ground.

I knew it had been foolish to hope that the hostility had gone over her head—she wasn't a young child after all—but I still wished she hadn't noticed it. I felt embarrassed of the way my _parabatai_ was acting.

"What was it Alec called you? Para-something?"

"_Parabatai,_" I responded. "It means a pair of warriors who fight together—who are closer than brothers. Alec is more than just my best friend. My father and his father were _parabatai _ when they were young. His father was my godfather—that's why I live with them. They're my adopted family."

I thought of Alec, and our recent disputes. And over a _girl_, no less. I had to talk to him. We couldn't let something silly like this drive a wedge between us.

"But your last name isn't Lightwood?"

"No," I confirmed. I turned to look at her when we stopped in front of her house. I could see the age in the building, the grandeur it used to have, not twisted and hidden by the city that had grown up around it, like weeds overrunning a beautiful garden. The house was all in one piece, nothing to even hint at the things that had gone on inside it.

"It looks the same," Clary said.

I grimaced a little.

"On the outside." I pulled out my new sensor, identical to the one Clary had killed the Ravener with. I saw her looking at it with a new curiosity.

"So that's a sensor? What does it do?" she asked, her eyes sparkling with the familiar curiosity.

"It picks up frequencies, like a radio does, but these frequencies are demnic in origin," I explained. It felt something like talking to a child. Not in a demeaning way, or insulting, but just the fact that everyone I had ever met who was my age already knew everything about Shadowhunters. I didn't have to explain anything because they already knew. I was beginning to realize, though, that it was somewhat refreshing to get a new point of view on things. It was nice to see how somebody, raised so drastically different, saw things.

"Demon shortwave?" I fought back a smile. She never failed in relating things I told her to things that she understood better.

"Something like that."

We climbed the stairs, her feet echoing hollowly. I held my sensor out warily. It clicked quietly, but the frequency wasn't strong enough for it to heat up at all, so I wasn't really concerned.

"It's picking up trace activity, but that could just be left over from that night. I'm not getting anything strong enough for there to be demons present now," I assured her, when she looked at the sensor. It fell silent moments later, erasing any leftover doubts.

"Good," she said. I heard her let out a breath and smiled. She bent over and pulled her keys out from her shoelaces. As she straightened up, I saw her freeze, her eyes widening. I followed her gaze to see the deep gouges in the wooden door. They were from a Ravener, I had no doubt. Probably the one she killed.

I placed my hand lightly on her arm. "I'll go in first," I said. It looked like she wanted to argue, but her eyes were far away, and she said nothing.

I pushed the door open and stepped inside, gesturing for her to follow suit. It was dim inside, I noticed immediately. I looked around for a light source, and saw only one bare bulb hanging above, blackened to the point where I knew it must have blown. The door leading to the hedge-witch's home was closed and it appeared to be empty. I looked around the room again, noticing something glistening on the banister. I ran my hand on it and lifted it up to look at the substance. I grimaced. "Blood."

"Maybe it's mine," Clary said weakly. "From the other night."

"It'd be dry by now if it were," I said, struggling to come up with a plausible explanation. I couldn't imagine one so I didn't give her one. "Come on."

I walked up the stairs, glancing behind to make sure she was following me. When we reached the door, she struggled to get her keys in the door, her hands shaking ever so slightly. I leaned forward, waiting for her to manage the simple task of unlocking a door.

"Don't breathe down my neck," she hissed at me. My eyebrows rose and I leaned back a little, just as I heard the click of the door unlocking. She moved to enter, but I pulled her back.

"I'll go in first." She didn't move for a second, making me think that she wasn't going to listen, before she stepped aside.

I passed by her, feeling the temperature drop when I entered the apartment. There was no way that could mean anything good. I walked down the hallway, Clary just behind me, until I reached the living room. My eyes narrowed as I took in the room in front of me. As opposed to the war-zone it had been before, the room was now spotless, and completely bare. There wasn't an ounce of furniture to be found, no decorations, not even curtains. I saw Clary, stunned and silent, walking towards the kitchen. I followed her slowly. The kitchen was just as empty as the living room. The only difference was, while the living room had seemed to not have been touched in years, the kitchen looked as though it had been looted, cabinets left open with bare shelves. I heard Clary clear her throat.

"What would demons want with our microwave?" I shook my head, frowning.

"I don't know, but I'm not sensing any demonic presence right now," I assured her. "I'd say they're long gone."

When she said nothing, I spoke up. "Are you satisfied? There's nothing here."

She looked to me quickly, shaking her head. "I want to see my room."

I opened my mouth to snap at her. What could she possibly gain from seeing another empty room? But I didn't. I couldn't blame her for wanting to see everything. I probably should have thought to check the whole place as well.

"If that's what it takes." Sure that any danger that had been here was gone now, I tucked my seraph blade away.

When we went into the hallway, I wondered for a moment how Clary could see well enough to navigate. I had a rune to help me with my vision, but she had no such commodity. Then I felt a little stupid when I realized that she'd lived here all her life. How could she not be able to find her way?

I saw her stop at a door and reach for the knob. She jumped a little when her hand touched it. Just then, I heard a sound from inside the room. I opened my mouth to stop her, but it was too late, she had already turned the knob.

The door blew outward, knocking Clary to the ground. She skidded across the floor while my back slammed against the wall. I fumbled for my seraph blade, cursing myself for putting it away. I looked up in shock at the Forsaken towering over me. The Forsaken was big but definitely not the biggest one I'd fought alone. It would be easy to take it out—the Forsaken weren't very smart—but the real challenge would be keeping Clary from harm while I fought it. Knowing her, she'd probably try to help.

I eyed the ax the monster held, finally lifting my blade. "_Sansavi_!" The blade shot out, and I swiped it at the giant. It slashed across its chest and it stepped back, roaring inhumanely.

I raced over to Clary, grabbing her arm and yanking her to her feet. I pushed her ahead of me down the hall, trying to get her to move faster. I was used to the speed of Shadowhunters, not untrained mundanes.

We raced through the entry way out to the landing. I turned to slam the door shut behind us, trying to buy some time to instruct Clary. The door trembled against the giant's weight. I saw Clary backing away, her eyes wide. I turned to her quickly, feeling my adrenalin began to pick up as it always did during a fight.

"Get downstairs! Get out of the—"

I heard the impact of the door snapping from its hinges and jumped to the side, just as the door flew right into where I had been standing. I turned to Clary, shouting. "Get downstairs! I can't kill it and protect you!"

The monster was bellowing loudly when I turned back to it. It was racing towards me, faster than its anatomy should have allowed. I ducked as the axe it had been holding flew towards me. I just barely escaped an unwanted haircut as it bit deeply into the wood of the railing behind me.

I laughed. The thing's aim was horrendous. It didn't go for the axe like I'd expected, instead it jumped at me, its fists—each twice the size of my head—raised.

I swung my blade out, feeling it slice through skin and muscle. It sunk to the hilt, a solid hit, in its shoulder. I tried to jump aside as it reached for me, but it had grabbed me before I could get out of the way. I felt my body hitting against the steps as we fell, and then it was still. I kept my eyes clenched against the pain in my shoulder and legs. I breathed deeply through my nose, taking a minute to get my situation figure out. I heard footsteps slapping on the stairs quickly. I felt a hand rest on my shoulder, light as a feather.

"Jace?" I heard the concern and fear in Clary's voice and felt my heart clench a little. I opened my eyes to look at her.

She was kneeling over me, her face a mask of worry, and then relief when she saw me open my eyes. Her bright hair fell around her face, her green eyes shining.

"Is it dead?" I asked, averting my eyes from the angel hovering over me for a fraction of a second before looking back at her. She grimaced.

"Almost."

I tried to move, only to wince against the pain in my legs. I could barely feel the,, pinned so under the giant.

"Hell. My legs—"

"Hold still," she ordered, moving away. I felt her crouch by my head, grabbing under my arms and pulling. I felt a mixture of relief and pain when my legs slipped free. I looked over to see Clary's face a little red from her effort then looking at the spasming, dying creature. Clary's hands slipped away and I struggled to my feet, holding my left arm carefully. I'd injured it falling. I had felt it too, when my shoulder cracked against one of the steps. I saw Clary scrambled to her feet beside me.

"Is your arm alright?"

"No," I said. "Broken. Can you reach into my pocket?"

I saw her eyebrows shoot up and she bit her lip hesitatingly before nodding. "Which one?"

I fought a smirk at her reaction, knowing I was fully capable of using my good arm to retrieve the weapon.. "Which one?"

"Inside jacket, right side. Take out one of the seraph blades and hand it to me," I instructed.

I didn't move when she stepped closer, reaching for my pocket unsurely. She slipped her hand in, and I felt her warmth, her hair tickling my nose. She pulled away, blushing, and held out the tube, looking away.

"Thanks," I said, biting my cheek to hold back a grin. "Sanvi," I said, watching the blade shoot out just like the other one, a dagger of light.

"Don't watch," I told Clary, assuming that she wouldn't appreciate what I did next.

I stood over the Forsaken, bringing my blade down into its chest in one swift movement.

Blood splattered out, speckling my boots. I heard Clary let out a small sound in the back of her throat. I huffed. "I told you not to watch," I said, grimacing against the pain in my shoulder.

"I thought it would disappear," she said. I could hear some panic in her voice, which confused me. What was she panicking about? "Back to its own dimension—you said."

"I said that's what happens to demons when they die," I corrected. I flinched when I began to pull my jacket off of my injured shoulder. I brandished my stele, watching with a little amusement when Clary eyed it with mistrust.

"This is a stele." I began to apply the mark, her eyes watching the movement carefully. "And this is what happens when Shadowhunters get injured." I finished the mark, feeling it began to work its power as I pulled my hand away. It disappeared quickly, leaving just silvery lines behind.

I moved my shoulder in a circular motion, sighed as the pain eased. I clenched my fist, shrugging it up and down. Clary watched me in awe.

"That's amazing. How did you—"

"That was an _iratze_, a healing rune. Finishing the rune with the stele activates it," I told her. I slipped my stele back into my belt and put my jacket back over my shoulder.

Then I smiled a little. "We're going to have to report this to Hodge. He'll freak out."

She raised a brow at me. "Why will he freak? And I get that that thing isn't a demon—that's why the sensor didn't register it, right?" I nodded, proud that she was grasping things so well. She was going to fit well into the world of Shadowhunters.

"You see the scars all over its face?"

"Yes." I saw her shudder as she glanced at it. I couldn't blame her.

"Those were made with a stele, like this one. You asked me what happens when you carve marks into someone who doesn't have Shadowhunter blood. Just one mark will only burn you, but a lot of marks, powerful ones? Carved into the flesh of a totally ordinary human being with no trace of Shadowhunter ancestry? You get this. The runes are agonizingly painful. The marked ones go insane—the pain drives them out of their minds. They become fierce, mindless killers. They don't eat or sleep unless you make them, and they die, usually quickly. Runes have great power and can be used to do great good—but they can be used for evil. The Forsaken are evil." When I finished explaining it, I felt like I had just given a forty-five minute lecture.

"But why would anybody do that to themselves?" Clary asked, looking at me in horror and shock.

I shook my head, my mouth twisting to the side.

"Nobody would. It's something that gets done to them. By a warlock, maybe, some Downworlder gone bad. The Forsaken are loyal to the one that marked them, and they're fierce killers. They can obey simple commands, too. It's like having a—a slave army," I said, struggling to find the right words before stepping over the carcass.

I glanced back at Clary. "I'm going back upstairs."

"But there's nothing there," she said, looking bewildered.

"There might be more of them." I felt my stomach clench in excitement at the thought of another fight. "You should wait here."

"I wouldn't do that if I were you." The strongly accented, high pitched voice was case for me to whip around in shock.

"Madame Dorothea?" Clary exclaimed in shock. I eyed the old woman carefully. Although I had already checked out her home and confirmed that she wasn't a real witch, I was beginning to hold my doubts. How did she possibly know about the Forsaken?

"But…"

"More _what_?" Clary cut in.

"More Forsaken," the hedge-witch replied cheerfully. She looked disdainfully at the bloody surroundings. "You have made a mess, haven't you? I'm sure you weren't planning on cleaning it up, either. Typical," she spat.

"You're a _mundane_," I finished my earlier thought. Her eyes shot to me, her thin eyebrows raised.

"So observant, the Clave really broke the mold with you." My confusion was suddenly overrode with anger. How _dare_ his mundane, who had clearly know about the danger without warning us, insult me?

"You know about the Clave? You know about them, and you knew there were Forsaken in this house and you didn't notify them? Just the existence of Forsaken is a crime against the Covenant—"

"Neither Clave nor Covenant have ever done anything for me," she replied angrily. Her accent switched then, from a typical New York to something more abnormal and foreign—almost like the ones Idris natives like myself held, but not quite. "I owe them nothing."

"Jace, stop it," Clary snapped, infuriating me further. She turned away from me, to the woman. "If you know about the Clave and the Forsaken, then maybe you know what happened to my mother," she said hopefully. I rolled my eyes skyward. As if this woman, clearly against the Clave, would willingly help two Nephilim children.

Dorothea's gaudy earrings jingled when she shook her head. "My advice to you is to forget about your mother. She's gone."

I stepped over quickly as Clary began to sway where she stood, putting my hand under her elbow so I could catch her if she began to fall. I glared at Dorothea hatefully. How did she possibly think that that was needed?

"You mean she's dead?" Clary's voice was a near-whisper. I heard the tremor in it and narrowed my eyes at Dorothea. If Clary's mother was dead, and she dropped it on her like she just had, I would slit her throat where she stood, mundane or not.

"No," she said reluctantly, her eyes flashing to my warning glance as she did. She better not be lying now either. "I'm sure she's still alive. For now."

"Then I have to find her," Clary said, her voice strengthening. "You understand? I have to find her before—"

The woman held up a hand stubbornly, cutting Clary off. "I don't want to involve myself in Shadowhunter business."

I saw Clary's eyes shimmer as her hope of help from this woman began to crumble.

"But you know my mother. She was your neighbor—" I saw Dorothea's eyes harden and knew she was going to say no, no matter what Clary said. So I cut her off, using our last option to receive some answers.

"This is an official Clave investigation. I can always come back with the Silent Brothers," I threatened, knowing I would do it. I would do anything to keep Clary's cheeks dry.

She saw the truth in my eyes and sighed. "Oh, for the—" She glanced from her door to us. "You might as well come in. I'll tell you what I can." She led us back to her door before pausing to shoot me a glare.

"If you tell anyone I helped you, Shadowunter, you'll wake up tomorrow with snakes for hair and an extra pair of arms," she threatened. I smirked.

"That might be nice, an extra pair of arms. Handy in a fight."

"Not if they're growing out of your…" She glanced at Clary, cutting herself off when Clary blinked innocently at her. "Neck."

"Yikes," I said mildly, finding amusement in the fact that Madame Dorothea's original implication went right over Clary's head. She was too innocent.

"Yikes is right, Jace Wayland." And the woman turned and stormed into her apartment, her amazingly gaudy ensemble flowing with the wind.

Clary looked at me, her head tilted to the side a little in curiosity. "Wayland?"

"It's my name," I clarified, wary. "I can't say I like that she knows it."

We watched the woman disappear, leaving the strong scent of incense to mix with the stench the fight had left. Clary shrugged a little.

"Still, I think we might as well try talking to her. What have we got to lose?"

I sighed. Definitely too innocent.

"Once you've spent a bit more time in our world you won't ask that again."

She frowned a little at me before turning and following Dorothea into the apartment. I trailed after her, my hand carefully on the knife in my belt.

* * *

**Okay guys, this Friday, I'm going to be leaving for Florida for a week. I might update the next chapter on Friday before we leave, but I'm not sure yet.**

**Review and let me know if you want the update this Friday or when I get back.**


	5. Chapter 5

**Happy Valentine's day! Here's chapter five as your present :)**

* * *

We walked through heavy incense and bead curtains, posters featuring all kind of thing that mundanes easily fell for hung on the walls. I watched Clary as she looked over a poster with a hand, lines labeled across it. Over the top, I read the Latin words, _In Manubus Fortuna_. I scoffed quietly as I translated it. _In the hands of fate_.

Madame Dorothea appeared suddenly, popping in through one of the curtains of beads. "Interested in chiromancy? Or just nosy?"

"Neither," Clary said, almost snapping. "Can you really tell fortunes?"

I rolled my eyes. No.

"My mother had a great talent. She could see a man's future in his hand or the leaves at the bottom of his teacup. She taught me some of her tricks." Then she looked at me, her eyes narrowing on my hand, ready on my blade. I looked at her levelly. "Speaking of tea, young man, would you like some?"

"What?" I said, furrowing my brows in confusion.

"Tea. I find it both settles the stomach and concentrates the mind. Wonderful drink, tea."

"I'll have tea" Clary answered politely.

I finally agreed, knowing full well that she planned on checking our tea leaves. "All right. As long as it isn't Earl Grey. I hate bergamot."

Dorothea cackled obnoxiously before leaving us, presumably to go make the tea. I wandered over to one of the shelves along the wall. I eyed the books carefully, finding nothing of interest. Clary's voice spoke up behind me.

"You hate bergamot?"

"You have a problem with that?" I asked, watching her discreetly out of the corner of my eyes.

"You may be the only guy my age I've ever met who knows what bergamot it, much less that it's in Earl Grey tea." I felt a smirk make its way to my lips, knowing that would be the case. Mundanes don't know much at all about their world, really.

"Yes, well, I'm not like other guys. Besides, at the Institute we have to take classes in basic medicinal uses for plants. It's required." I flipped one book off the shelf, looking through it rolling my eyes at the ridiculous contents.

"I figure all your classes were stuff like Slaughter 101 and Beheading for Beginners. "

I felt the corners of my lips turn up. "Very funny, Fray."

I saw Clary suddenly spin to face me. "Don't call me that," she snapped, angrily.

I turned to face her fully, shocked. "Why not? It's your last name, isn't it?" I saw her cheeks suddenly redden as she turned away.

"No reason." I knew then that that must be what someone she was close to called her. It was like how I would respond if someone called me Jonathan, my real name. Nobody did, because that's what my father had called me. I couldn't think of a single person I would permit to call me that.

"I see." I placed the book back on the shelf, deciding to change the topic. "This must be the trash she keeps up front to impress credible mundanes. There's not one serious text here." I shook my head, looking scornfully at the offending books. Decorations, more like it.

Clary sounded angry when she responded. "Just because it's not the type of magic you do—"

I scowled at her, and she snapped her mouth shut quickly, leaning away from me slightly even though she was across the room. I regretted frightening her, but she needed to understand.

"I _do not do magic_. Get it through your head: Human beings are not magic users. It's part of what makes them human. Witches and warlocks can only use magic because they have demon blood," I finished, trying to drive the point into her head. It seemed like we'd just had this conversation, with Alec.

She stayed silent for a minute and I thought I had startled her into silence before she spoke up.

"But I've seen you use magic. You use enchanted weapons—"

"I use tools that are magical," I clarified. "And just to be able to do that, I have to undergo rigorous training. The rune tattoos on my skin protect me too. If you tried to use one of the seraph blades, for instance, it's probably burn your skin, maybe kill you," I said, more as a warning to her to stay away from magical items. Instead of looking worried, she looked merely curious and I bit back a groan.

"What if I got the tattoos? Could I use them then?"

The words brought a picture to mind, of Clary, her skin covered in marks like mine. I yearned for that to be real, for her to be able to fit in that well.

"No," I replied, nearly sighing in disappointment as I forced the image away. "The Marks are only part of it. There are tests, ordeals, levels of training—look, just stay away from my blades. In fact, don't touch any of my weapons without my permission," I warned, hoping I could get it through to her this time. I didn't want her to get hurt because she tried to use one of my seraph blades and burned her hand off.

"Well, there goes my plan for selling them all on eBay." I looked at her in confusion.

"Selling them on _what_?"

"A mythical place of great magical power," Clary said with an insipid smile. I had a slight feeling that she was mocking me, but I couldn't be sure so I just shrugged.

"Most myths are true, at least in part," I said.

She sighed quietly. "I'm starting to get that."

Dorothea popped her head in then, cutting off any response I could have come up with. "Tea's on the table. There's no need for you two to keep standing there like donkeys. Come into the parlor," she said crudely.

Donkeys? Clary said, just as I was about to give a witty retort about when Clary spoke.

"There's a parlor?"

"Of course there's a parlor, where else would I entertain?" Dorothea said, her eyes narrowing. I glared at her, not enjoying the hostility she was showing towards Clary. The young girl, however, didn't seem to notice.

"I'll leave my hat with the footman," I said, one eyebrow going up. The woman gave me a dark look.

"If you were half as funny as you thought you were, my boy, you'd be twice as funny as you are," she snapped. My eyebrows furrowed. I felt my head tilt to the side in confusion as I tried to process that in my mind as she disappeared through the curtain.

"I'm not quite sure what she meant by that," I said, looking to Clary.

"Really," Clary snapped. "It made perfect sense to me." She stormed away and I watched her do so, still confused.

"What the hell?" I muttered, shaking my head. Then I followed her.

My eyes adjusted quickly to the dimmer lighting. Stuffed creatures hung from the ceiling and I looked up at them with distaste. I grimaced as I saw the dust stirred up when we stepped on the stained Persian rugs placed over the ground. I stepped lightly, trying to ignore the dust and clutter of the room. I saw bright pink, absolutely horrendous chairs surrounding a low table. A deck of tarot cards sat on one end, a completely fake and tacky crystal ball on the other. The tea service in the middle drew my attention. Sandwiches rested on a platter near it and I eyed them warily. I was hungry, I hadn't eaten anything this morning, but I was wary of what was in them.

Clary sat down in one of the chairs, her hair clashing with the bright fabric.

"Wow," she said weakly. "This looks great." I saw her face relax a little as she rested back against the chair.

I sat down beside her, finding that the chairs were, in fact, comfortable, despite their god awful appearance.

Dorothea offered Clary tea, and she accepted, requesting sugar. I made a note of the fact that she liked sugar in her tea.

I picked up the plate of sandwiches, staring at the suspiciously. I finally shrugged and set the plate down, holding one. I took a bite of it and wrinkled my nose. I saw Clary staring at me warily.

"Cucumber," I informed her.

"I think cucumber sandwiches are just the thing for tea, don't you?" Dorothea said, speaking to nobody.

"I hate cucumber," I said with a grimace. I held it out to Clary and she took it from me, biting into it without hesitation. I smiled a little at her, shaking my head. Her stomach was grumbling and I realized then that I probably should have fed her at some point. Then I shrugged mentally. She's getting food now.

"Cucumber and bergamot. Is there anything else you hate that I ought to know about?" Clary asked, looking at me curiously.

I had been taking a sip of tea and paused to look over at Dorothea. "Liars."

"You can call me a liar all you like. It's true, I'm not a witch. But my mother was," Dorothea said.

I choked on the sip of tea I'd been drinking, looking at the woman with disbelieving eyes.

"That's impossible," I snapped.

"Why impossible?" Clary asked, her eyes shining with her normal curiosity.

"Because they're half-human, half-demon. All witches and warlocks are crossbreeds. And because they're crossbreeds, they can't have children. They're sterile."

"Like mules," Clary said perkily. "Mules are sterile crossbreeds."

I almost laughed, thinking of how a witch or warlock might respond to her comparing them to mules.

"Your knowledge of livestock is astounding. All Downworlders are in some part demon, but only warlocks are the children of demon parents. It's why their powers are the strongest."

"Vampires and werewolves—they're part demon too? And faeries?" Her eyes were shining as she looked at me in interest, chewing on a bite of sandwich.

"Vampires and werewolves are the result of diseases brought by demons from their home dimensions. Most demon diseases are deadly to humans, but in these cases they worked strange changes on the infected, without actually killing them. And faeries—"

"Faeries are fallen angels," Dorothea interjected. "Cast down out of heaven for their pride."

"That's the legend," I said scornfully. "It's also said that they're the offspring of demons and angels, which always seemed more likely to me. Good and evil, mixing together. Faeries are as beautiful as angels are supposed to be, but they have a lot of mischief and cruelty in them. And you'll notice most of them avoid midday sunlight—"

"For the devil has no power except in the dark." I glared at her. She was getting very annoying. I was trying to tell Clary the truth of my world and she kept trying to incorporate her own beliefs.

"'Supposed to be?'" Clary asked, looking to me with a slight tilt to her head. A strand of bright curls fell into her eyes. "You mean angels don't—"

"Enough about angels," Dorothea snapped at her. My head whipped around to face her and I turned my body so that it was facing her fully again. Somehow while we'd been talking, I'd ended up facing Clary completely.

I was seriously getting tired of this woman. She was undermining every bit of progress I tried to make in teaching Clary anything about the Shadowworld.

"It's true that warlocks can't have children. My mother adopted me because she wanted to make sure there'd be someone to attend to this place after she was gone. I don't have to master magic myself. I have only to watch and guard." I narrowed my eyes at her. So that's what this was.

"Guard what?" Clary asked.

"What indeed?" Dorothea said, winking at Clary. I saw Clary blink in confusion.

The woman reached for a sandwich from the plate, but it was empty. I eyed Clary, wondering how a little thing like her had managed to eat so much without even seeming to realize it. I always heard mundane girls complaining about how hard it was to stay fit, to lose weight, but Clary made it look easy.

"It's good to see a young woman eat her fill," Dorothea said. "In my day, girls were robust, strapping creatures, not twigs like they are nowadays."

"Thanks," Clary said quietly. She seemed somewhat disturbed though, and set her teacup down clumsily. I looked at her carefully. Her waist wasn't as narrow as Isabelle's, but Isabelle was—as Dorothea put it—a twig. Comparing the two, I came to a sudden realization that Clary's figure was a lot more attractive to me than a stick-thin one. She looked almost _healthier_. Like she had a certain glow to her due to her body shape.

It amazed me, how Isabelle's waist could be so much tinier while Clary was still more delicate somehow. Maybe it was in how her face was built, or her bones, or more likely her height, but whatever it was it just added more to her beauty. I looked away quickly as she flashed her eyes to me.

I realized that Dorothea had pounced on her cup, peering into it carefully.

"She's reading your tea leaves," I said, having vaguely heard Clary's questioning.

I leaned forward in interest, although I tried to hide it. I wanted to know what could be read about the girl beside me. I saw Dorothea's face morph into a scowl.

"Is it bad?" Clary asked, worriedly.

"It's neither good nor bad," she replied vaguely. "Give me _your_ cup." She looked at me.

"But I'm not done with my—" Before I could even finish, the teacup had been snatched from my hand, the tea emptied back into the pot. She looked into the now empty cup, frowning.

"I see violence in your future, a great deal of blood shed by you and others." She paused for a second and I bit back a sarcastic reply. I was a Shadowhunter. Blood and violence are kind of in the job description. "You'll fall in love with the wrong person." I nearly jerked back at that. Then I rolled my eyes. So far, she was just saying the same typical things that she would say to any mundane client of hers. "Also, you have an enemy." I raised a brow, smirking at her.

"Only one? That's good news." I relaxed back in my chair as she gave me a knowing look, her eyes flickering between Clary and I. I narrowed my eyes, confused.

Then she picked up Clary's teacup again, her thick brows furrowed.

"There is nothing for me to read here. The images are jumbled, meaningless. Is there a block in your mind?" She asked, looking at Clary accusingly. Clary just looked confused again.

"A what?"

"Like a spell that might conceal a memory, or might have blocked out your Sight."

Clary shook her head immediately, her hair bouncing on her shoulders. "No, of course not." I leaned forward suddenly.

"Don't be so hasty. It's true that she claims not to remember ever having the Sight before this week. Maybe—"

"Maybe I'm just a late developer," Clary snapped at me angrily. Just as I got ready to make a joke about that, she cut me off. "And don't _leer_ at me just because I said that.

I tilted my head up in false offense. "I wasn't going to."

"You were working up to a leer, I could tell," she said, her eyes narrowed and arms crossed over her chest. I fought the overwhelming urge to crack a grin.

"Maybe. But that doesn't mean I'm not right. Something's blocking your memories, I'm almost sure of it."

"Very well," Dorothea said. "Let's try something else." She swapped out the tea cup for the tarot cards. She expertly fanned them out, holding them in front of Clary. "Slide your hand over these until you touch one that feels hot or cold, or seems to cling to your fingers. Then draw that one and show it to me."

Clary reached out and did as Dorothea instructed. I watched as her skeptical face stayed that way. She grabbed one, seemingly at random. I wondered if she had actually listened, or if she had just grabbed one randomly. She held it up for Dorothea to see. The hedge-witch looked mystified. "The Ace of Cups, the love card."

Clary flipped the card over, examining it carefully. I saw recognition flicker in the green depths of her eyes. I felt something teasing at the back of my mind as well. I felt like I knew that card somehow, like I'd seen it before. "This is a good card, right?" She asked, her eyes still skimming over the design of the card.

"Not necessarily," Dorothea contradicted. "The most terrible things men do, they do in the name of love. But it is a powerful card. What does it mean to you?"

"That my mother painted it," Clary said, dropping to card to the table. "She did, didn't she?"

Dorothea nodded, pleased. "She painted the whole pack. A gift for me."

I stood up then, not trusting how much exactly she knew about Clary. I was tired of listening to the woman drone on in hopes of getting something out of her that we could use.

"So you say. How well did you know Clary's mother?"

Clary tilted her head back to look up at me. "Jace," she said softly. "You don't have to—"

Dorothea cut her off, fanning the cards across her chest and leaning back with a level glare towards me.

"Jocelyn knew what I was and I knew what she was. We didn't talk much about it. Sometimes she did favors for me—and in return I'd tell her the occasional piece of Downworld gossip. There was a name she asked me to keep an ear out for, and I did."

I kept my face carefully blank. I had a sinking feeling that I knew whose name Clary's mother had been listening for. I was also pretty sure I knew what Jocelyn was now.

"What name was that?"

"Valentine," Dorothea said, her gaze challenging me. For what, I didn't know.

"But that's—" I cut Clary off quickly, not wanting to reveal too much to this woman.

"And when you said you knew what Jocelyn was, what do you mean? What was she?"

"Jocelyn was what she was. But in her past she'd been like you. A Shadowhunter. One of the Clave," Dorothea revealed.

I heard Clary's small gasp. "No," she whispered. I felt my chest clench at the sadness and betrayal in her voice. Dorothea looked at her sympathetically and I wanted nothing more than to put Sanvi to good work. She had no right to look at Clary like that. She'd been the one to cause her pain. I knew my feeling were irrational, we had been here to find out exactly this, but I couldn't help but be protective of the innocent girl.

"It's true. She chose to live in this house precisely because—"

"Because this is a Sanctuary," I said. "Isn't it? Your mother was a Control. She made this space, hidden, protected—it's a perfect spot for Downworlders on the run to hide out. That's what you do, isn't it? You hide criminals here." My voice rose steadily with anger. Dorothea's eyes flashed.

"You _would_ call them that. You're familiar with the motto of the Covenant?" I nearly snorted. I was a Shadowhunter. Of course I did.

"_Sed lex dura lex_, the law is hard but it is the law." And it keeps balance.

"Sometimes the law is too hard," she countered. "I know the Clave would have taken me away from my mother if they could. You want me to let them do the same to others?" Her voice was sharp.

"So you're a philanthropist. I suppose you expect me to believe that Downworlders don't pay you handsomely for the privilege of your Sanctuary?" My fists were clenched by my side in anger and I felt the snarl on my face.

The woman grinned, a cruel grin. "We can't all get by on our looks like you." I brushed the attempt at flattery away, saving it to boast about later.

"I should tell the Clave about you—"

"You can't!" Clary cried, jumping to her feet. I looked at her, shocked. "You promised," she nearly hissed.

"I never promised anything," I snapped back.

I strode over to the far wall then. I ripped the curtain from the wall, knowing full well that the portal rested behind it. "You want to tell me what this is?"

"It's a door, Jace," Clary said, looking at me flatly. Even as she said it, I saw her eyes looking it over in confusion.

"Shut up," I snapped. "It's a portal isn't it?"

Dorothea set the tarot cards back down on the table. "It's a five-dimensional door. Dimensions aren't all straight lines, you know," she said, speaking now to Clary. "There are dips and folds and nooks and crannies all tucked away. It's a bit hard to explain when you've never studied dimensional theory, but, in essence, that door can take you anywhere in this dimension that you want to go. It's—"

"An escape hatch," I finished. "That's why your mother wanted to live here. So she could flee at a moment's notice." Clary looked confused.

"Then why didn't she—" I saw her eyes grow wide as she stopped herself short. Her face grew pale, her eyes beginning to shine. "Because of me," she whispered. "She wouldn't leave me that night. So she stayed." I saw the guilt, fear, and just plain _pain_ in her face and I knew exactly what she was thinking. Usually she was so hard for me to read, but now she was like an open book in all caps.

"You can' blame yourself." She ignored me, pushing by me and reaching for the door.

"I want to see where she was going to escape to—"

"Clary, no!" I yelled, lunging for her. I saw her pulled into the portal before she could even finish her sentence, and without a second's hesitation, I jumped in after her.

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**I hope you enjoyed it! I only have about another half of a chapter written so far but on a 20 hour drive to Florida that I'm going on today, I have no doubt I'll get some serious writing done!**

**Don't forget to review!**

**-Cassidy**


	6. Chapter 6

**I'm sorry for the long wait :( I was on vacation and then when I got back, I had three papers assigned and one is due today and I didn't do it so...**

**Anyway, have fun with this chapter :)**

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I was familiar with the feeling of a portal, but I had been unprepared to be flying through space. So instead of landing gracefully on my feet, I collided hard with the ground. Well, Clary's body to be exact. I smelt her strawberry shampoo and I could feel her hair brush over my skin. My forehead hit hers, our knees colliding. I felt an elbow collide painfully with my ribs.

"Ouch," I said in her ear. It hadn't really hurt bad. I'd had much, much worse and taken it silently. I just didn't want to have dead silence. Now _that_ would be awkward. "You elbowed me."

"Well, you _landed_ on me," she hissed, slightly breathlessly. Her tone reminded me to pull my weight off of her. I raised myself up to my elbows, looking down at her. Her face was flushed and she looked up at me with narrowed eyes. _As if this was _my_ fault_, I though indignantly.

Even as I felt my temper rise ever so slightly, I was hit with the sudden realization that I did not want to move from my position on top of her. I could feel my body against hers, and my mind rejected the idea of moving.

"Well, you didn't leave me much choice, did you? Not after you decided to leap merrily through that portal like you were jumping the F train. You're just lucky it didn't dump us out in the East River," I snapped.

"You didn't have to some after me," she said indignantly.

"Yes, I did," I argued, thinking of how badly injured she could be if I had left her alone. She was easy prey for any Downworlder or demon that saw her wandering around. The thought of her injured or worse was like a shot to the chest. "You're far too inexperienced to protect yourself in a hostile situation without me."

I saw her eyes soften a fraction, but not enough to make a difference in her mindset. "That's sweet. Maybe I'll forgive you."

"Forgive me?" I said, thrown off. "For what?"

"For telling me to shut up," she said, her chin up in the air.

"I did not…" I trailed off when I realized that I had. "Well, I did, but you were—"

"Never mind," she sighed.

She rolled her head to the side a little and I found it a little odd that we were both completely comfortable with the current situation. Just as I thought that, she stiffened under me. I was about to move off of her, thinking she'd become uncomfortable, when she spoke.

"I know where we are."

"What?"

"This is Luke's house," she said. She sat up, pushing me to the side. I rolled gracefully to my feet and held out a hand to help her up. She ignored my help and stood up on her own. I dropped my hand, feeling more rejected than I probably should.

I looked around, seeing that we were in front of a small, gray row house. I read the lettering on the swinging sign in front of the house out loud. "_Garroway books. Fine Used, New, and Out-of-print. Closed Saturdays."_ I eyed the mail, untouched on the porch, and the heavy padlock on the front door. "He lives in a bookstore?"

"He lives behind the store," she corrected. "Jace, how did we get here?"

"Through the portal," I told her, although I thought she could have figure that out at least. I fiddled around with the padlock, trying to figure out if I could break into it. "It takes you to whatever place you're thinking of."

"But I wasn't thinking of here," she argued. "I wasn't thinking of anywhere."

"You must have been," I responded absently. "So, since we're here anyway…"

"Yeah?" Clary asked with a sigh. I knew she wanted to know more about the portal, but I didn't feel up to explaining everything about them. She could ask Hodge later if she wanted to know.

"What do you want to do?" I asked, waiting for her reply and hoping it would be the same as what I was thinking.

"Leave, I guess," she said bitterly. Well that wasn't what I'd been thinking. "Luke told me not to come here."

I shook my head in disbelief. Now she started doing what she was told? "And you just accept that?"

I saw her wrap her arms around her body, as though she wanted some sense of security. I felt the overwhelming urge to put my arms around her and hold her to me, to feel her body against mine.

"Do I have a choice?" she asked, her voice almost a whisper. I wanted to scoff, but choked it back.

"We always have choices. If I were you, I'd be pretty curious about Luke right now. Do you have keys to the house?" I asked as an afterthought. I didn't really _need_ them, but they'd be easier than doing an unlocking rune multiple times to undo the stupid padlock.

"No, but sometimes he leaves the back door unlocked." I saw a flicker of her natural curiosity flare back up in her eyes as she pointed to a small alley, separating Luke's home from the one beside it. I eyed the place warily. It'd be pretty hard to explain why two teenagers were breaking into his house if it turned out he was just sitting there drinking a cup of coffee and reading the newspaper.

"You sure he isn't home?"

"Well, his truck's gone, the store's closed, and all the lights are off. I'd say probably not."

I felt my lips twitch up into a smile and felt the urge to call her a smartass. I almost did, but figured she'd take it the wrong way.

"Then lead the way." I scanned the area as we came up to a chain-link fence. There was no movement from any direction. The fence seemed to be surrounding a small yard, weeds overrunning anything else's growth.

"Up and over," I said. I began to climb the fence easily, hopping over the edge and dropping down.

My feet hit something soft, and I jumped back as whatever I'd landed on cried out. I saw a shape break from the bushes in front of me. It was clearly a human shape, although any kind of Eidolon demon would be capable of mimicking that.

I could feel my heart beat speed up. I was ready for a fight.

I sprung to my feet, racing after the shadow. I gripped the collar of a shirt and yanked back on it, throwing the shape—now definable as a teenage boy, around my age, maybe a few years younger—to the ground. I jumped down onto him, pinning him to the grassy earth. His arms were up over his face, hiding it from view.

"Got him!" I shouted, pleased. I saw Clary rushing over from the fence and reached down to pull the boy's arms from his face. "Come on, let's see your face—"

"Get the hell off me, you pretentious asshole!" The boy shoved at me, trying to push me off of him. I shifted my weight, allowing him to sit up halfway.

"_Simon_?" Clary cried suddenly. I groaned mentally.

"Oh, God," I sighed. "And here I'd actually hoped I'd got a hold of something interesting."

"Clary?" I sighed, standing up and releasing the mundane boy. He scrambled up ungracefully, fixing his crooked glasses.

I looked at him critically while Clary made her way over. I caught sight of a rib right up the side of the jeans she'd borrowed from Isabelle and rolled my eyes in my head, amazed that she'd missed all the action, yet still managed to ruin her clothing.

"Where the hell have you been?" the boy snapped. I glared at him as Clary visibly flinched. She didn't respond and he scoffed, turning around and dropping himself down onto the back steps. Clary looked after him for a second before following. I rolled my eyes and went passed them, throwing my legs over the railing and leaning back against a beam.

"But what were you doing hiding in Luke's bushes?" Clary asked, ignoring the mundane's question still. It almost made me grin. I saw Clary reach up to brush her hand through his hair, knocking leaves and twigs from it. The boy looked angry, and I wanted to hit him, knowing that if she were running her fingers through my hair, I'd be a lot more appreciative.

"That's the part I don't get," Clary finished, shaking her head. Finally, the mundane snapped, jerking away from her.

"All right, that's enough. I can fix my own hair, Fray." My eyebrows shot up when I realized why she'd snapped at me when I'd called her that. That was her little boy-toy's nickname for her.

I caught her eyes flicker to me out of the corner of my eye, seeing her look at my hands where I was filing my nails with my stele. I almost grinned. Even when she was talking to the mundane, she was still looking at me. She turned back to Simon then.

"I mean, did Luke know you were there?" she asked, completely ignorant to the fact that he was clearly pissed with her.

"Of course he didn't know I was there," the boy said, almost growling at her. "I've never asked him, but I'm sure he has a fairly stringent policy about random teenagers lurking in his shrubbery."

_Then maybe you shouldn't have been doing it, mundie,_ I though irritably. Everything this boy did or said seemed to grate against my nerves.

"You're not random; he knows you," Clary pointed out. She was either oblivious to her obvious anger, or she was ignoring it. "The main thing is that you're alright."

She tripped even me up on that one. Why wouldn't the fool be okay? She was the one who'd been attacked by a demon, almost died, found out she was a completely different race than she'd thought, had her mother go missing, and been abandoned by this Luke.

"That _I'm_ alright?" the boy cried, letting out a sharp laugh. I scowled, disliking the harsh sound about as much as I disliked the source of it. "Clary, do you have any idea what I've been through this past couple of days?"

"Not near as much as her, mundie. Suck it up, princess," I muttered under my breath.

"The last time I saw you, you were running out of Java Jones like a bat out of hell, and then you just…disappeared. You never picked up your cell—"

_Probably because she smashed it on the pavement when she got a frantic call from her now-missing mother._

"then your home phone was disconnected—then Luke told me you were off staying with some relatives upstate when I _know_ you don't have any other relatives. I thought I'd done something to piss you off."

The moron thought that she'd had her house phone disconnected because he'd made her angry? Mundanes…

"What could you possibly have done?" she asked softly, reaching for his hand. He looked away, yanking it from her. She looked hurt, biting her lip. Again, I wanted to knock the moron out.

"I don't know," he said lamely. "Something." I chuckled. Something so bad that she disconnected her home phone? Seriously, this kid was stupid.

"You're my best friend. I wasn't mad at you," she said, sounding surprised. I saw the harsh glare Simon shot to the ground and shook my head at his ignorance. As much as he seemed to have a crush on Clary, he seemed to be treating her pretty harshly right now. You'd think he would be kinder.

"Yeah, well, you clearly couldn't be bothered to call me and tell me you were shacking up with some dyed-blond wanna-be goth you probably met at Pandemonium, after I spent the past three days wondering if you were _dead_."

I gritted my teeth and looked up quickly, fighting the urge to stick one of my blades through his chest. Where did this mundane get off insulting me? Or treating Clary like that. She _could_ have been dead, for all he knew, with what she'd gone through. Apparantly he didn't know Clary as well as he thought he did if he thought she would just 'shack up' with some guy she found at a club. I'd only known her for a couple days and I already knew she wasn't like that.

"I was not shacking up," Clary said indignantly, looking offended.

"And my hair is naturally blonde," I added, glaring cruelly at him when Clary looked away. "Just for the record."

"So what have you been doing these past three days, then? Do you really have a great-aunt Matilda who contracted avian flu and needed to be nursed back to health?" I gave the boy a flat look, wondering if he was still in the third grade.

"Did Luke actually say that?" Clary asked, her brows up at her hairline in disbelief.

"No. He just said you had gone to visit a sick relative, and that your phone probably just didn't work out in the country. Not that I believed him."

I wondered suddenly what he would have told the boy if Clary had never returned, if she had been killed by the Ravener in her home. Then I shuddered at the thought of the lively girl lying dead on the floor, her eyes staring blankly up at the ceiling. I shook my head to clear the image away. Some things didn't need to be thought about and that was one of them.

"After he shooed me off his front porch, I went around the side of the house and looked in the back window. Watched him packing up a green duffle bag like he was going away for the weekend. That was when I decided to stick around and keep an eye on things." I scoffed quietly. Who did the boy think he was, a detective?

"Why?" Clary asked, sounded confused. "Because he was packing a bag?"

"He was packing it full of weapons," he said grimly. That got my attention. My head swung over to face them. If this guy was packing weapons, he could very well be a part of the Shadow World.

"Knives, a couple daggers, even a sword," he listed. "Funny thing is, some of the weapons looked like they were glowing. Now are you going to say I was imagining it?" That sold it. Luke was a member of the Shadow World. Glowing weapons would most likely mean a seraph blade, although it could be something else. Chances were, Luke was a Shadowhunter.

"No," Clary said, and for a minute I was startled, thinking I had spoken out loud before I realized that she was talking to the mundane. "I'm not going to say that." She turned to me and I looked back at her, trying to discern how she would react if I spoke my thoughts. "I'm going to tell him the truth," she said, her jaw set. I sighed.

"I know," I said. I was clearly not going to be able to change her mind. We could always take the mundane to the Silent Brothers later to have his memory wiped of the Shadow World.

"Are you going to try to stop me?" Her chin was up defiantly and I knew she wouldn't let me if I did try, even if I told her that it would be better if the boy was ignorant.

I looked away, back at my stele.

"My oath to the Covenant binds me. No such oath binds you," I admitted reluctantly.

I felt her eyes leave me as she turned back to the mundane. "All right. Here's what you have to know," she began.

"This guy, Jace, he's a Shadowhunter and he…"

I tuned out, not really needing or wanting to hear this whole story retold. For a while, I watched Clary as she explained the Shadow World to her friend, her hands waving wildly as she tried to describe the Ravener demon that had tried to kill her.

Her bright eyes were glowing while she talked about the fight with the Forsaken, and I realized that she enjoyed talking about the Shadow World. I felt a rush of pleasure at the thought. She _liked_ it, the adventure, the people, the magic, the new revelations, the danger. I could see it in her eyes as they sparkled while she spoke. She may be in a bad position now, confused and scared, her mother missing, but it was like she had been bored with her life, and now she had something more.

I looked away when her eyes flickered to me, and I heard my name.

"…and Jace followed me through, because he said I could've gotten killed on my own and…"

I tuned out again with a hidden smile. When I heard her clear her throat, I turned to look at them again, thinking she was trying to get my attention. She wasn't though, and I watched her as she looked warily at the mundane. "So, any questions?"

The boy put his hand up like and I felt the overwhelming urge to throw something at it, thinking he was reaching out to touch Clary. Then I shook myself when I realized how stupid that was.

"Oh, I've got questions. Several." I sighed. It was going to be dark by the time we got back to the Institute, and that wasn't good. Demons came out when the sun went down, and I knew I could fight them off, but I wasn't sure if I could fight them off and properly protect Clary.

"Okay, shoot," she sighed, leaning forward to rest her elbows on her knees. The boy pointed at me and I barely kept myself from scowling at him.

"Now, he's a—what do you call people like him again?"

"He's a Shadowhunter," she responded. _Like you are_, I added silently, looking at her and hoping she would tell him that she was one too. But she didn't, and I was disappointed that she hadn't accepted it yet.

"A demon hunter," I added, biting back the bitterness that surged up. "I kill demons. It's not that complicated, really."

I slipped my stele back into my coat pocket, tipping my head back to rest it against the beam I sat against.

"For real?" I almost turned around and snapped at him. _No, we're lying. She just spent about an hour telling you all this just to laugh and say 'gotcha'._

"For real," Clary confirmed, sounding slightly amused.

"And there are vampires too? Werewolves, warlocks, all that stuff?"

"So I hear," Clary said, sounded concerned suddenly that he would call her crazy and run off.

"And you kill them too?" Simon asked, his question louder as he directed it to me. I didn't look back, staring at my nails instead.

"Only when they've been naughty."

There was silence for a minute and I half hoped that he would do something stupid, call her a lunatic and run off. Then I felt bad, knowing that it would destroy her. She'd already lost her mother, and this Luke. She didn't need to lose her friend too. But I wanted him gone, badly. He had no business here. Clary was a Shadowhunter, she belonged. This mundane didn't. Finally, he spoke.

"That is _so awesome_." I turned quickly to look at him.

"Awesome?"

The boy nodded vigorously. "Totally. It's like dungeons and dragons, but _real_."

My brows furrowed as I looked at him. What the _hell_? "It's like _what_?"

"It's a game," Clary said, her cheeks turning pink. "People pretend to be wizards and elves, and they kill monsters and stuff." I looked at her, completely confused.

Why would they pretend to be wizards and elves if they didn't believe in them? And what kind of game was this? Did they dress up and spar, like actors? The mundane looked at me with a grin.

"You've never heard of dungeons and dragons?"

"I've heard of dungeons," I said in confusion. "Also dragons, although they're mostly extinct." He looked at me in disappointment.

"You've never killed a dragon?" Well, I had, but it was just a Draki demon. I was about to say that when Clary spoke, sounding cross.

"He's probably never met a six-foot-tall hot elf-woman in a fur bikini either. Lay off, Simon." I looked at her in confusion, but she wasn't looking at either of us, glaring down at the grass instead.

"Real elves are about eight inches tall. Also, they bite," I said, still trying to see why Clary was acting oddly.

"But vampires are hot, right?" the mundane asked. "I mean, some of the vampires are babes, aren't they?" Clary looked at him incredulously.

I thought about it, thinking back on all the vampires I'd ever seen. They were all fairly attractive once they were turned. Their looks drew their pray in. But they were so pale, and skinny.

"Some of them, maybe," I finally decided. The newer ones tended to look more human.

"_Awesome_," the mundane said with a grin. I frowned before slipping off the railing and walking over to them.

"So are we going to search the house or not?" I asked, looking to Clary for an answer. Instead, the mundane responded.

"I'm game," he said, scrambling ungracefully to his feet while Clary stood slowly, watching me for my reaction. "What are we looking for?"

"We? I don't remember inviting you along," I said, looking at him with false sincerity. I was being nasty, I knew, but I didn't like this boy. He was a _mundane_. He didn't need to be around. He didn't _belong _with us.

"_Jace_," Clary hissed, looking at me in annoyance. I almost snapped at her, started yelling and telling her that he didn't belong here. That he had nothing to do with the world she was in now, that she needed to leave him behind. I wanted to. I wanted to yell at her until she understood. I wanted to yell at the mundane, make him go away and leave Clary and I alone. But I didn't.

I forced my lips to turn up in a half-smile. "Just joking." I wasn't, I wanted him gone so badly it hurt. I stepped to the side to allow them to get to the door. "Shall we?" Clary smiled ever so slightly and stepped up to the door, fumbling in the dark.

I could see much more clearly than she could. I had burned a rune into my arm before we left that allowed me to see better in the dark. She finally turned the knob and the mundane followed her in. I followed more slowly, taking one last look back to make sure than nobody had seen us go inside. I closed the door behind me as I stepped in, to see Clary looking up at me in disappointment.

"It's locked." I pulled my stele out, stepping past the boy and standing beside Clary.

"Allow me, mundanes." I put my hand on her arm and pushed her gently to the side. She stepped back willingly, giving me space to work. I heard Clary's friend speak up, probably thinking he was speaking quietly.

"He's a piece of work, isn't he? How do you stand him?" I was about to make a nasty comment when Clary responded softly.

"He saved my life." She sounded defensive even as her voice was low. Simon made a sound of irritation and I went back to the lock, drawing a quick rune into the soft wood. I turned the knob and pushed the door open, cutting off Simon's response.

"Here we go," I said, walking through and hearing the others follow me. I looked around and saw a typical, cozy bookstore. Shelves were labeled across the room, and boxes were stacked everywhere. I guessed that he was in between a shipment.

"The apartment's through here," Clary said, brushing past me to head towards it. As she did, I turned my head to face her and caught a strange gleam on the far wall. I narrowed my eyes, unable to make out what it was from here.

I grabbed her arm, holding her back. "Wait."

She immediately stopped moving, turning to look back at me, her brows going up in question.

"Is something wrong?"

"I don't know," I said before slipping away from her and squeezing between two tall stacks of books. I looked closely at the objects and froze. "What the hell?" I said under my breath, whistling quietly. I jumped up onto a boz, getting a closer look.

"Clary, you might want to come over here and see this," I called.

"It's so dark," she said, her voice small as I turned and saw her moving slowly through the dark room towards me. I watched her for a second before pulling my witchlight stone from my pocket and closing my fingers around it. I held it up over my head and saw Clary's head snap up to look at me, eyes wide.

I saw the mundane boy turn his head away, blinking. "Ouch," he complained. I laughed lightly at his pain and saw him glare at me.

"Witchlight," I explained, seeing Clary's curious glance at it.

"Wonderful," Simon muttered as Clary began to make her way through the boxes until she had reached me.

"Look at that," I said when she'd reached me, pointing to the manacles I'd found handing on the wall. She stared at them in confusion for a moment before her lips parted in a small 'o', her eyes widening.

"Are those—"

"Manacles," the mundane cut her off. I looked at him sharply and he sneered at me before looking back at Clary. It was pathetic, how he always seemed to plead for her attention. "That's, ah…"

"Don't say 'kinky'," Clary snapped, glaring at him. I turned back to look at the manacles to hide my grin. "This is Luke we're talking about."

I reached up and ran a finger along the inside rim of one of the manacles, feeling dried flakes that seemed to be rust chip off. But I knew it wasn't rust. "Blood," I stated, eyes skimming the rest of the scene before me. "And look." I rubbed the dried blood off on my pants and pointed to the next clue of a struggle. The chains, where they disappeared into the wall, had been pulled on hard enough that the plaster had been cracked and it was bumped out with the force. "Someone tried to yank these things out of the wall. Tried pretty hard, from the looks of it." I chewed my lower lip, wondering if maybe Luke wasn't the one truly responsible for the phone call from earlier.

It looked like there had been a serious struggle here. If he had been being tortured, they may have forced him to say the things he did to Clary. Or maybe it was the other way and Luke had been the one to chain someone up.

"Do you think Luke is alright?" Clary asked, her voice small and worried.

"I think we better find out," I answered, leaping down from the box. Clary was chewing viciously at her bottom lip as I had been seconds ago. Her eyes were wide and concerned as she looked up at the manacles one more time before leading Simon and I back into the apartment part of the building.

The living room was cluttered, books overfilling the floor-to-ceiling shelves. Clary looked around carefully, looking for anything unusual—the same thing I was doing. I saw the mundane veer off through an entryway and secretly hoped that he would be eaten by a demon. My hopes were dashed when he called out to us, stepping into the doorway.

"I think he's still around. The percolator's still on and there's coffee here. Still hot." Clary stepped up to him and peered into the kitchen.

I walked over as she stepped through, Simon turning and following her. I stepped through into the hallway she'd disappeared into, ignoring the mundane, who remained in the kitchen. I saw Clary exit one room and step across the hallway into another, not noticing me.

I poked my head in as she paused, looking around the room sadly. Then she kneeled down beside the bed and I thought for a second that she was praying before she bent over and pulled a bag from under the bed, opening it and shifting through it. I saw her pull out a bottle of shampoo and figure it was hers. I stepped away, content that she wasn't getting eaten by a Ravener

The door I opened next led to an office that was decorated with artifacts from all over the world. I looked around curiously before moving over to the desk, seeing a green duffel resting on it. It must have been the bag the mundane saw Luke packing. It was filled to the brim with weapons. I looked through the weapons, noting the ones that no mundane would have access to. There was a seraph blade thrown inside, probably what Simon had seen glowing. He had unique weapons as well, some that hardly anybody used.

I heard soft footsteps behind me and smelled strawberry shampoo as they approached me. Clary. She reached out a hesitant hand and ran her finger over the circular, razor-sharp disk curiously.

"It's a _chakram_," I said, looking up at her. "A Sikh weapon. You whirl it around your index finger before releasing it. They're rare and hard to use." I thought of the time Hodge had suggested I train with them. It was the only weapon I had never been able to master. "Strange that Luke would have one. They used to be Hodge's weapon of choice, back in the day. Or so he tells me." Clary smiled a little, nostalgically.

"Luke collects stuff," she said, gesturing to the shelves of figures and statues I'd seen when I entered. "Art objects. You know, pretty things." Her voice was soft and I was more focused on how she sounded than what she was saying.

I shook myself out of the slight daze I had been in and shifted some of the weapons gingerly to the side. Some clothing spilled out and I frowned when it revealed a picture frame. I picked it up, peering into the smiling faces of Clary, an older version of her that I assumed was her mother, and a man who was probably Luke. It had a giant crack across it.

"I think this is yours, by the way," I said, handing her the framed picture. She took it gingerly.

"That _is_ mine," she said, sounding surprised.

"It's cracked," I said obviously. She continued to stare down at it.

"I know. _I_ did that—I smashed it. When I threw it at the Ravener demon." She looked up at me, just as I realized what that meant. "That means Luke's been back to the apartment since the attack. Maybe even today—"

"He must have been the last person to go through the portal," I finished. "That's why it took us here. You weren't thinking of anything, so it sent us to the last place it had been." Clary's face twisted as though she'd just eaten a lemon.

"Nice of Dorothea to tell us he was there."

"He probably paid her off to be quiet," I said. It was a harsh realization. That meant that he was most likely not on our side. If he was paying her to hide him, then he could very well be a criminal. "Either that or she trusts him more than she trusts us. Which means he might not be—"

"Guys!" I saw Clary jump as the mundane rushed into the office. I was tempted to throw the _chakram_ at him. "Someone's coming!" The photo fell back into the bag as Clary looked up at him.

"Is it Luke?" The boy stuck his head back out to look at the hallway. I scoffed. He wasn't even smart enough to check who it was first.

"It is. But he's not by himself—there are two men with him."

"Men?" I wouldn't be so sure. It could be a number of things from demons to fellow Shadowhunters there to arrest him. I sped through the room and peered out around the corner. I saw three men, two in long robes, Accord robes.

"Dammit," I cursed. "Warlocks."

"Warlocks? But—"

I shook my head, cutting her off and backing away. "Is there some way out of here? A back door?"

I glanced at Clary to see her shake her head, looking terrified. She was frozen in her spot and I looked around hopelessly for somewhere to go. If it had been just me, I would have stood and fought. But I couldn't fight two warlocks and a probably traitorous Shadowhunter all at once and protect Clary and her ignorant friend as well. Then I saw the room divider that I'd overlooked earlier.

"There. Get behind that. _Now_," I ordered, rushing after them as they scrambled towards it.

I barely had time to duck behind it before the door swung open. I crouched beside Clary, feeling her hair tickle my nose. I swiped a hand in front of my face to clear the strands away. It would most definitely be a bad time to sneeze. Three male voices floated through the room but the screen muffled it slightly. Thinking quickly, I pulled my stele from my pocket once again and drew the tip across the surface of the screen, the thin surface easy to burn into. I slid it in a square and watched as the inside turned clear.

Clary made a tiny sound of surprise, leaning towards it to look in it. I watched her for a second, seeing how her eyes gleamed in wonder, her lips parted ever so slightly. She looked at me quickly, pulling away from it with a panicked look. She thought that we would be revealed. I mouthed words at her, hoping she could read lips.

_They can't see us through it, but we can see them._ She nodded and leaned back towards it, peering in the edge. Clary seemed to tense as someone stepped into the room. All I could see was legs. I could hear better now that the pane was there.

"Yes, feel free to look around. Nice of you to show an interest," a man said, his voice gruff with bitterness. I heard a chuckle in response and tapped the corner of the window, forcing it to move out more. I could see more clearly now, three men standing around the room, one looking ragged and torn up as he looked at the others with thinly veiled contempt.

The two being glared at were wearing dark red robes, Accord robes that had been worn strictly by the warlocks at the last Accords. Luke was dealing with warlocks?

As the men turned, I caught sight of one of their faces and froze, my muscles tightening. Everything in me screamed for me to jump out with a blade in hand and run them through with it. I recognized them, even from all those years ago.

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**Hope you liked it :)**

**Don't forget to review :D**

**-Cassidy**


	7. Chapter 7

**Hey guys! Sorry for the wait but my computer has been kind of spazzing out and I can't get on the internet so i had to wait for a flashdrive from my sister and then upload this chapter onto the SUPER SLOW family desktop. **

**Anyway, I hope you enjoy :)**

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"Those are warlocks?" Clary asked softly, almost inaudibly. I didn't respond, focusing on calming my heart rate. If I attacked them now, I had no doubt Clary would follow. She could be hurt if she tried to fight two well-trained Shadowhunters, and I didn't want her hurt yet again.

I focused on that, on keeping her safe. I thought of her, lying in the infirmary, possibly dying, and forced myself to think that the loss of my temper could result in that once again. I listened to the conversation between the three men, only half hearing them as I my mind continued to scream at me.

_Those are the men who killed him! Those are the traitors who took him from you! Why aren't you doing anything?_ I tuned the voice out, focusing back on the conversation as I heard the name Jocelyn come up. Wasn't that the name of Clary's mother?

"…hidden by Jocelyn."

"That may be," the uncloaked man—Luke—admitted grudgingly. "So she hasn't told you where it is yet?"

"She has not regained consciousness," one of the cloaked me said. I looked at him more closely, trying to remember all the details to report to Hodge later. "Valentine is disappointed. He was looking forward to their reunion."

"I'm sure she didn't reciprocate the sentiment," Luke said bitterly.

"Jealous, Graymark? Perhaps you no longer feel about her the way you _used_ to."

I could see Clary's hands shaking and longed to put mind over them to steady hers. I saw her clasp them together and the shaking slowed, although it didn't cease.

"I never felt any way about her, particularly. Two Shadowhunters, exiled from their own kind, you can see why we might band together." _Exiled?_ "But I'm not going to try to interfere with Valentine's plans for her, if that's what he's worried about."

I didn't like this at all. Valentine? Valentine was _dead_. Dead and in the ground. But here these three men are, talking about him like he was alive. The most deadly criminal of the Shadow World was alive. And he had Clary's mother.

"I wouldn't say he was worried. More curious. We all wondered if you were still alive." All? I didn't like the sound of that. "Still recognizably human." I narrowed my eyes. None of this made sense. What did they mean, human?

"And?"

"You seem well enough," the man, Pangborn, said. Then he changed the topic rapidly. "There was a child, wasn't there? A girl." Luke looked surprised.

"What?"

"Don't play dumb," the other man, who had remained silent until now, growled. "We know the bitch had a daughter. They found photos of her in the apartment, a bedroom—"

I felt dread rush up in me. It was one thing for them to have Clary's mother. But now we were sure that they knew of Clary herself. I promised then, silently, that I would protect Clary at all costs. She was getting pulled into a dangerous place. Something was going on here. Valentine had returned, and it seemed like Clary was caught right up in the middle because of her mother.

"I thought you were asking of children of mine," Luke said, cutting off the man. "Yes, Jocelyn had a daughter. Clarissa. I assume she's run off. Did Valentine send you to find her?"

"Not us, but he is looking."

It felt like my stomach had dropped to the floor. Valentine, the man who slaughtered hundreds of innocents, was looking for Clary. "We could search this place."

"I wouldn't advise it," Luke said, his face gone deadly cold. "What makes you think she's still alive? I thought Valentine sent Raveners to scour the place. Enough Ravener poison and most people will crumble away to ashes, leave no trace behind." I felt suspicious then. He knew that she wasn't dead. She had called him. But maybe he assumed she'd gone back to the apartment after the call.

It would make sense from his point of view. She had nobody else, she was alone and scared. It would make sense that she would go back to her home. But he didn't know that we were here for her, that the Shadowhunters had found her before anything that bad could happen.

"There was a dead Ravener. It made Valentine suspicious."

"Everything makes Valentine suspicious." I raised a brow. He was talking about the man like he knew him personally. "Maybe Jocelyn killed it. She was certainly capable."

"Maybe," the quieter man said reluctantly. Luke shrugged then.

"Look, I've got no idea where the girl is, but for what it's worth, I'd guess she's dead." I felt Clary flinch slightly by my side at the uncaring tone in his voice and my fist clenched. I wanted to hit him.

"Anyway, she's not much of a danger. She's fifteen years old, she's never heard of Valentine, and she doesn't believe in demons." I nearly laughed out loud. She may not believe in all that, but she did kill a Ravener with just a sensor. Not dangerous? Bullshit.

"A fortunate child," one of the men chuckled.

"Not anymore," Luke said bitterly.

"You sound angry, Lucian," Blackwell observed.

"I'm not angry, I'm exasperated. I'm not planning on interfering with Valentine's plans, so you understand that? I'm not a fool." Liar. You're most definitely a fool. Talking about Clary like that was dangerous with me in the room.

I furrowed my brows at the thought. For one, the man didn't even know I was here. And for two, why the hell was it dangerous to insult Clary?

"Really? It's nice to see that you've developed a healthy respect for your own skin over the years, Lucian. You weren't always so pragmatic." I scowled. It was disgusting, how he was turning his back on Clary when she was clearly in danger for 'his own skin'.

"You do know, that we'd trade her, Jocelyn, for the cup? Safely delivered right to your door. That's a promise from Valentine himself."

"I know. I'm not interested." Clary flinched again, as though she'd been slapped. "I don't know where your precious cup is, and I don't want to get involved in your politics. I hate Valentine, but I respect him." _Coward,_ I spat in my head, wishing I was standing in front of the man to really say it. "I know he'll mow down everyone in his path. I intend to be out of his way when it happens. He's a monster—a killing machine."

"Look who's talking," one man snarled. I spun the Wayland ring on my finger thoughtfully. Luke was hiding something. Maybe he'd massacred someone's family. That would explain the animosity between the men.

"I take it these are your preparations for removing yourself from Valentine's path? Getting out of town, Lucian?" the man with an odd moustache asked suspiciously.

"Going to the country," Luke—or Lucian?—said affirmatively. "I plan to lay low for a while."

"We could stop you. Make you stay," Blackwell said calmly.

A sinister, nearly feral smile crossed Luke's face and I felt a sudden inkling of familiarity leak into my head. I now had a suspicion about this Luke. I narrowed my eyes at the look in his eyes. It was animalistic in the most bare of ways. It was a look I'd only seen on certain individuals, and I'd almost immediately put those down due to naughty behavior. Werewolves.

Was Luke a werewolf? But why would he have seraph blades if he wasn't a Shadowhunter? _Why wouldn't he have _marks_ if he was a Shadowhunter?_

"You could try," Luke growled, snapping me back from my speculations.

The men looked at each other, one giving a silent cue to the other. Pangborn looked at Luke.

"You'll notify us if you experience any sudden memory resurgence?"

"You'll be first on my list to call." With an irate look, Pangborn nodded.

"I suppose we'll take our leave. The Angel guard you, Lucian."

"The angel does not guard those like me," Luke said, sounding bitter. I narrowed my eyes, my suspicions nearly confirmed. "On your way, gentlemen?"

I watched as the Shadowhunters lifted their hoods and filed out the door. Luke followed a minute later after he'd checked over the room for anything forgotten. I stood up after hearing the deadbolt click into place. I shoved the screen aside and moved over to a desk in the room to lean against it.

I could hear Simon ask Clary if she was okay. I didn't even need to see her head shake to know what her answer was going to be. After what we'd just seen and heard? Neither of us were 'okay'.

"Of course she isn't," I snapped before moving on with the more important business.

"At least now we know who would send a demon after your mother. Those men think she has the mortal cup."

I saw Clary's eyes and mouth set in obstinacy and nearly sighed out loud.

"That's totally ridiculous _and_ impossible," she said.

I looked at her flatly. Most likely, she was wrong. But I wasn't going to worry what she thought when there was so much going on.

"Maybe. Have you ever seen those men before?" I glanced quickly at the mundane, who was staring at Clary as though he was worried she would fall apart. I almost scowled at him.

She was much stronger than he gave her credit for. I could see in the way that he handled her, like a piece of fragile glass, that he thought she was weaker than she was. He thought she would shatter at every little thing that happened. But she wouldn't. I'd known her only a couple days and I knew that.

"No," Clary replied with a sure shake of her head. "Never."

"Lucian seemed to know them," I commented, looking back at her. "To be friendly with them."

"I wouldn't say friendly. I'd say they were suppressing their hostility." I wanted to hit the mundane boy so bad. He didn't know what he was talking about like I did and I wished he would just keep his mouth shut.

"They didn't kill him outright. They think he knows more than he's telling," I corrected.

"Maybe," Clary said thoughtfully. "Or maybe they're just reluctant to kill another Shadowhunter."

A sharp laugh broke from my lips before I could contain it. It was a bitter, harsh sound and I saw her flinch slightly. "I doubt that," I said.

Clary looked at me harshly, as though angry at my judgment. Or maybe she was angry because it just seemed like I was arguing with everyone.

"What makes you so sure? Do you know them?" I had myself better contained—although not very well at all—by the time I responded.

"Do I know them? You might say that. Those are the men who murdered my father."

I saw the anger and stubbornness fade from her eyes, guilt and sadness replacing them. I turned away before I could see the pity form. I felt her touch my arm lightly. I didn't give her time to say anything before speaking blankly.

"We should go. We don't know when Luke might come back." I stormed away and out of the house, hearing two sets of footsteps following me. I waited for Clary and the mundane to exit before silently locking the door back up with a locking rune.

It was dark, the moon hanging above us, when we left. I grimaced slightly. Night means demons and I had two people that I would need to protect should a fight break out. I was content with the silence between the three of us when the mundane spoke up again with another useless question.

"Does anyone want to tell me where we're going?"

"To the L train," I responded, forcing my tone to come of neutrally.

"You've got to be kidding me," he said. I wanted to hit him once again. "Demon slayers take the subway?" I was too lost in my own thoughts to focus on making a snarky reply.

"It's faster than driving," I replied instead.

"I thought it'd be something cooler, like a…" I stopped paying attention quickly, focusing on my scattered thoughts.

My father's killers. They were alive and I'd seen them. I wanted them dead more than anything. It would be perfectly lawful to kill them. A Shadowhunter who turns on his own is worse than the worst demon. But I knew that them being dead wouldn't be enough. No, I needed to be the one to kill them. They needed to see me and know what they'd done, what they'd taken from me.

When I realized that the mundane was still droning on, I felt my irritation rise up tenfold. I was on the verge of cracking, and if I did, it wouldn't be pretty. I had just seen my father's killers and he was talking about some _van_.

"Simon," I heard Clary snap suddenly. "Enough." I looked at her out of the corner of my eyes and saw her watching me. I could see a mixture of emotions burning in the green depths of her eyes, but the only ones I could read were relief and guilt.

Relief about Simon shutting up, and guilt for making him? I shrugged it off, ignoring the occasional looks she shot me. I would never admit it, but seeing her sneak looks at me made me feel a little lighter about all that was happening. It minimized my guilt ever so slightly when I realized that she couldn't stop looking at me just like I couldn't stop thinking about her.

Because even though I was thinking about my father, I was still thinking about Clary. And I knew that it was wrong. I should only be worried about vengeance for my father, not if the girl I'd rescued was okay.

The rest of the walk to the subway was silent. I noticed Clary chewing on her lip for time to time, emotion burning in her green orbs. As hard as I tried, I couldn't decipher what the emotions were. I was in a sort of mental haze as I led the way from the subway to the Institute. I could hear that Clary and the mundane weren't speaking and wondered if one of them was mad at the other.

_One can only hope_, I thought bitterly. As I made my way up the steps to the Institute doors, I heard the mundane make an odd sound in the back of his throat, almost as though he was choking on something.

"You live _here_? But it's a church." I pulled the Institute key from around my neck and rolled my eyes to myself.

"We find it useful to inhabit hallowed ground." He barely even missed a beat before speaking again.

"I get that but, no offence, this place is a dump." I bit my tongue to keep a comment back. It grated against my nerves for him to be insulting my home as he was and I was hit with another urge to stab him with something. Maybe a fork.

"It's a glamour, Simon. It doesn't really look like this," Clary said, sounding exasperated with her friend.

"If this is your idea of glamour, I'm having second thoughts about letting you make me over."

I shoved the key into the lock and looked at the mundane boy. He looked fairly dumbstruck with Clary's defense of the building.

"I'm not sure you're quite sensible of the honor I'm doing you," I said. _Especially since Hodge will have my head when he sees you. _"You'll be the first mundane who has ever been inside the Institute."

There was no need to let the mundane know that I was going to get chewed out for this. He'd probably enjoy it too much.

"Probably the smell keeps the rest of them away." I saw Clary immediately jab an elbow into his side, looking at him in irritation.

"Ignore him. He always says exactly what comes to his head. No filters."

I did just that and ignored him when he mumbled something back to her, pushing the door open and leading them into the building. The elevator ride was silent and I noticed that Clary was chewing on her thumb a little, deep in thought. When we stepped into the entryway, I whistled loudly and tossed my jacket to the side. As expected, I saw Church slink towards us.

I knelt down and scratched behind the cat's ears.

"Church. Where's Alec, Church? Where's Hodge?"

He just meowed and I wrinkled my nose in slight irritation. Damn cat.

"Are they in the library?" Finally, the cat turned and trotted down that hallway. I followed him with a gesture for the others to follow me. We wandered down familiar hallways until I realized we were headed for the kitchen.

I frowned. It wasn't time for lunch or dinner yet, so I couldn't understand why they'd be in the kitchen.

"I don't like cats," the mundane announced out of nowhere. I saw Church's ears pin back slightly and wondered when the cat would sneak in a claw or bite in the near future. I hoped I was around to see it.

"It's unlikely, knowing Church, that he likes you, either."

I sped up my pace slightly so I was walking besides Church where I could no longer hear Clary and Simon talking. I looked down at the blue cat with a tiny smile.

"What do you think of him?" The cat's nose wrinkled and his ears pinned back. He hissed quietly and I grinned.

"Yeah, that was about my reaction. What about Clary?" He looked up at me with knowing and bright eyes. He didn't give any other reaction and I frowned.

"What's that supposed to mean?" I swear, if cats could smirk…

Before I could get a better reaction—Church was an excellent judge of character—we were turning into the kitchen. Before I even had time to take in who exactly was in the room, Isabelle was speaking.

"I made soup, are you hungry?" She asked, waving her giant mixing spoon at me. I grimaced at both the horrendous smell of whatever she was making and the fact that this was most definitely _not _Alec. She turned around and I waited for the worst.

"Oh, my God," she said, her eyes narrowing. "You brought another mundie here? Hodge is going to kill you." I frowned. Did she think I didn't know that?

"I'm Simon," the mundane said. I rolled my eyes before turning to glare down at Church, who looked a bit too smug. So that's what the knowing look had been about, not my question about Clary.

"JACE WAYLAND," Isabelle spat, ignoring him. "Explain yourself."

"I told you to bring me to Alec!" I told him. "Backstabbing Judas."

"Don't blame Church," Izzy snapped before turning back to the soup, her anger seemingly appeased. "It's not his fault Hodge is going to kill you." I sighed.

"I had to bring him," I defended. "Isabelle—" here goes nothing. "Today I saw two of the men who killed my father." I could see Isabelle freeze, her shoulders tensing. She turned to face me, warily. I usually wasn't at my most sane when my father came up, so I couldn't blame her for her hesitation.

She pointed the spoon accusingly at the mundane. Clary looked on with raised brows. "I don't suppose he's one of them?" I saw Clary's eyes snap to her friend, as though expecting him to defend himself.

The boy was just staring at my adopted sister, not focusing in the slightest on what she was saying. I saw Clary roll her eyes as she noticed the same thing, only a moment after me.

"Of course not," I said finally. "Do you think he'd be alive if he were?"

I saw Isabelle taking the mundane in carefully before shrugging. "I suppose not."

I could practically feel my jaw drop when she snatched a small piece of the whole fish resting on the counter up and allowed it to slap to the floor. It was only there for a fraction of a second before Church had sucked it up like a vacuum. It was the quickest I'd ever seen the lazy cat move.

"No wonder he brought us here. I can't believe you've been stuffing him with fish again. He's looking distinctly podgy," I said, wrinkling y nose slightly in disgust. Izzy rolled her eyes.

"He does not look podgy. Besides, none of the rest of you never eat anything. I got this recipe from a water sprite at Chelsea market. He said it was delicious—" I'd already tuned the talkative girl out.

"If you knew how to cook, maybe I _would_ eat," I said under my breath.

"_What_ did you say?"

_Shit_.

"I said I'm going to look for a snack to eat," I said, slipping away over to the fridge, fearful of the spoonful of toxic liquid she held in her hand.

"That's what I thought you said," she said smugly, turning back to the soup—if you could call it that.

I heard a thump before quick footsteps followed me to the fridge.

"I can't believe you're eating," Clary snapped, sounding appalled. I continued to peer into the fridge, looking for something edible.

"What should I be doing instead?" I questioned, although I knew fully what I would be expected to be doing that was much more productive.

I heard a thump followed by light footsteps coming closer.

"Wow, he's like a crazy roommate." I was confused for a moment and looked back at her to see her eyes skimming along the plastic containers marked with warnings from Hodge—which we rarely heeded.

"What, Hodge? He just likes things in order. Hmm, spaghetti." I reached for the container that I was fairly sure was still edible.

"Don't ruin your appetite," Isabelle warned from her position at the stove.

"That is exactly what I intend to do," I replied, kicking the fridge door shut. Remembering the tiny bit of manners I had, I offered some of the spaghetti to Clary. She shook her head as I pulled a fork from the drawer silverware was stashed in.

"Of course not," I said, shoving a mouthful of spaghetti into my mouth. "you ate all those sandwiches."

To my surprise, she seemed to barely even acknowledge the comment. "It wasn't that many sandwiches," she defended simply, glancing over to where Isabelle and the mundane were talking. Isabelle seemed to be eating up the attention from him and I saw an irritated look cross Clary's face.

I, in turn, felt irritated that _she _was irritated. Was she _jealous_ that the mundane seemed to have a thing for Isabelle? A better question was, _why did I care_?

"Can we go find Hodge now?" Clary asked, looking back at me.

"You seem awfully eager to get out of here," I observed, biting back the bitterness I felt.

"Don't you want to tell him what we saw?" she demanded. I could see her fingers clenching into her palms in annoyance.

"I haven't decided yet. But if you want to go so badly—"

"I do." I resisted the urge to scowl. She could've at least let me finish my sarcastic remark.

"Fine." I put the container down on the counter, shoving the fork back into it. No way was I risking a trip to the sink. It was too close to Isabelle's soup.

As we headed to the door, I heard the mundane speak up.

"Where are you going?" Clary looked back at him and I saw a strange kind of disdain on her face, as though she suddenly found him as annoying as I did.

"To find Hodge. I need to tell him about what happened at Luke's." Her tone even seemed as though she hated him. I wondered if the boy picked up on it, but when I looked at him he didn't seem to have noticed. Maybe I was imagining it because I wanted her to hate him like I did.

Isabelle looked over at us then. "Are you going to tell him that you say those men, Jace? The ones that—"

"I don't know," I said sharply. "So keep it to yourself for now."

"All right. Are you going to come back? Do you want any soup?"

"No."

"Do you think Hodge wants some soup?" I almost groaned.

"No one wants any soup," I said tiredly. She couldn't go one week without trying to cook could she?

"I want some soup," the mundane said, clearly trying to impress Isabelle. Despite that, I saw him glancing over at Clary every few seconds, but she was barely even paying attention as she kept glancing at the door.

"No you don't," I said. "You just want to sleep with Isabelle." I saw Clary look at me in surprise although she didn't admonish me for my comment.

"That is _not_ true," the mundane sputtered.

I saw Isabelle smirking into her soup but couldn't understand what she muttered.

"Oh yes it is. Go ahead and ask her—then she can turn you down and the rest of us can get on with our lives while you fester in miserable humiliation. Hurry up, mundie boy, we've got work to do."

I saw Clary's eye widen and wondered why of all the people in the room, I was most interested in her reaction.

"Leave him alone," she snapped, surprising me. Moments ago she had seemed vexed with the mundane and now she was defending him. "There's no need to be sadistic just because he isn't one of _you_."

I was actually feeling properly admonished when I responded naturally. "One of _us_," I corrected. In a bad tempered moment, I snapped at her, "I'm going to find Hodge. Come along or not, it's your choice." I rushed out the door without a thought and began storming down the hallway.

Thinking of Clary wandering the hallways, looking for me, halted me and I turned back to the kitchen with a sigh. I stood outside the door, waiting for her. I almost took off again when I remembered that she could just ask Church to show her the way. But then again, she wouldn't know what to ask and even if she did, Church wasn't exactly reliable.

I pulled a seraph blade from my pocket and began to twirl it around in my fingers. If she wasn't out in about a minute I would leave and—

My thoughts were interrupted when I heard the kitchen door swing open. I looked up and pocketed the weapon when I saw Clary looking at me.

"Kind of you to leave the lovebirds to it." Clary's frown became even more pronounced and I mentally kicked myself.

"Why are you always such an asshat?"

I had to try hard to choke down a laugh, afraid it would make her frown even more.

"An asshat?" She just scowled. But at least she didn't look upset anymore.

"What you said to Simon—"

"I was trying to save him some pain," I lied. I felt bad about how much I'd been lying lately, but I didn't want her to think that I was an asshole—or asshat as she put it. "Isabelle will cut out his heart and walk all over it in high-heeled boots. That's what she does to boys like that."

"Is that what she did to you?" I almost laughed at how ridiculous that was. Isabelle was my sister and it's all she'd ever been or ever would be. I shook my head and glanced down at Church.

"Hodge. And _really_ Hodge this time. Bring us anywhere else and I'll turn you into a tennis racket," I threatened, feeling too tense to even wonder if they made tennis rackets out of anything but plastic.

I followed Church as he walked down the hallway, trying to ignore that I could feel Clary's gaze burning holes into my back. I tried my best to ignore her presence, realizing that, yet again, I'd forgotten that I'd just seen my father's killers. How could I keep forgetting something like that because of some _girl_?

"Jace." Clary's voice was soft and I instantly looked back at her.

"What?" I asked, almost wincing at how harsh the syllable sounded.

"I'm sorry." I blinked in surprise. "For snapping at you."

_She_ was sorry? I chuckled, playing off my surprise. What did she have to be sorry for? I was the one who was being cruel. "Which time?" She was quiet for a moment and when she responded, her voice was still soft and the tiniest bit solemn.

"You snap at me too, you know."

"I know," I said, just as solemn. "There's something about you that's so—"

"Irritating?" She looked down at her feet and I saw her cheeks were slightly pink. But she didn't look surprised. It was as though she was told she was irritating fairly often.

"Unsettling," I corrected. I saw her eyes light up slightly as she looked back up at me. Her eyes flitted away again, as though she was afraid to say something and I wondered if she'd taken what I'd said as an insult. I certainly hadn't intended it that way. I actually wasn't sure how I intended her to take that.

"Does Isabelle usually cook dinner for you?" I smiled as I turned away from her.

"No, thank God. Most of the time the Lightwoods are here and Maryse—that's Isabelle's mother—she cooks for us. She's an amazing cook." I felt like I could be lost in thought forever over the delicacies Maryse had created in the past.

"Then how come she never taught Isabelle?"

"Isabelle never wanted to learn. She's always been first and foremost interested in being a fighter. She comes from a long line of women warriors. She's one of the best Shadowhunters I've ever known."

_Besides myself of course_.

"Better than Alec?" At first I thought she was being malicious, trying to get dirt on Alec. Maybe she hated him as much as he seemed to hate her. But then I noted the natural curiosity in her voice and I nearly smiled. She wasn't being malicious. She was being _Clary_.

As Church stopped at the foot of a metal staircase I forgot to reply to Clary. "So he's in the greenhouse. No surprise there."

"The greenhouse?" Clary asked, looking up at me as I stepped up onto the stairs.

"Hodge likes it up there. He grows medicinal plants, things we can use. Most of them only grow in Idris. I think it reminds him of home."

I could hear Clary's footsteps clattering on the steps behind me and smiled to myself. I'd have to teach her to walk silently, like a Shadowhunter should.

"Is he better than Isabelle? Alec, I mean."

I turned around to face her, leaning down dangerously. I saw her face take on a slightly haunted expression. I decided to press on with the conversation, hoping that look would fade.

"Better? At demon-slaying? No, not really. He's never killed a demon."

She looked surprised and I turned around to continue our way up.

"Really?"

"I don't know why not. Maybe because he's always protecting Izzy and me." I shouldered the heavy oak doors open, breathing in the familiar scent of the greenhouse as I stepped through. I ran my hands along the smooth leaves we passed, reveling in the feelings being in the greenhouse always brought up. It reminded me of home, in Idris.

"It smells like…" Clary trailed off as though she couldn't place the smell.

"Home, to me," I said, leading her through the stone pathways. I headed to where I knew the little pond Hodge liked to sit at was. When I found him, he seemed to be staring at the ceiling, looking for something intently.

"You look like you're waiting for something," I stated, breaking a leaf from a nearby plant and twisting it in my fingers, finding comfort in even the small movements of my fingers.

"I was lost in thought," Hodge responded, looking us over. His eyes widened as he took us in and the warm smile he'd offered disappeared.

"What happened? You look as if—"

"We were attacked. Forsaken," I reported quickly. Hodge seemed to stop breathing for a moment.

"Forsaken Warriors? Here?"

"Warrior. We only saw one."

"But Dorothea said there were more," Clary added in.

"Dorothea? This might be easier if you took events in order." I nodded in agreement, giving Clary a sharp look to make sure she stayed quiet and let me report what happened.

I reported everything as quickly as I could, recounting every detail except for who the men had been to me specifically. When I recounted their names, Hodge went pale, seemingly horrified by the names.

"It is as I feared," he said, almost a whisper. "The Circle is rising again."

"The Circle?" I asked, having never heard of it before. Whatever it was, it didn't sound good.

"Come with me," Hodges said, sounding wearier than ever. "It's time I showed you something."

We followed Hodge to the library silently, Clary shooting the two of us confused glances every now and then. I knew she wanted answers, but I had none to give her. When we reached the library, Hodge rushed off into the bookshelves, disappearing among the elongated shadows the shelves casted.

Clary took a seat on the red sofa, pulling her legs up beside herself. She seemed fairly calm while I was restless, needing to be doing something, _anything_.

"Hodge, if you need help looking—"

"Not at all," Hodge said, stepping out from the stacks, carrying a thick, leather-bound book. He was flipping through it in search of something and I switched my weight from foot to foot anxiously.

"Where…where...ah, here it is!" He began to read aloud from the book. "_I hereby render unconditional obedience to the circle and its principles…I will be ready to risk my life at any time for the circle, in order to preserve the purity of the bloodlines of Idris, and for the mortal world with whose safety we are charged."_

I didn't like how cryptic and just plain awful that sounded. "What was that from?"

"It was the loyalty oath of the Circle of Raziel, twenty years ago."

"It sounds creepy," Clary said bluntly. I almost laughed at how childlike it'd sounded, even though she was completely serious and right. "Like a fascist organization or something."

Hodge set the book down, looking pained.

"They were a group of Shadowhunters, led by Valentine, dedicated to wiping out all Downworlders and returning the world to a 'purer' state. Their plan was to wait for the Downworlders to arrive in Idris to sign the Accords. Approximately every fifteen years, they must be signed again, to keep their magic potent." For a second I wondered why he'd said that, when we all knew why the Accords were signed repetitively. When I saw Clary nod in understanding, I remembered that she _didn't _know everything she should. "Then they planned to slaughter them all, unharmed and defenseless. This terrible act, they thought, would spark off a war between humans and Downworlders—one they intended to win."

"That was the Uprising," I realized finally. I'd heard that story countless times throughout my life. "I didn't know Valentine and his followers had a name."

Hodge nodded. "The name isn't spoken often nowadays. Their existence remains an embarrassment to the Clave. Most documents pertaining to them have been destroyed." I narrowed my eyes, suddenly suspicious.

"Then why do you have a copy of that oath?"

"Because," Hodge responded mournfully. "I helped write it."

I felt as though the world was shaking around me. Hodge?

"You were in the Circle."

"I was," he admitted. "Many of us were." He wasn't looking at me, wasn't really looking at anything. "Clary's mother as well."

I saw Clary, out of the corner of my eye, flinch as though Hodge had physically hit her instead of speaking.

"_What_?"

"I said—"

"I know what you said!" Clary snapped, almost shouting. "My mother would never have belonged to something like that. Some kind of—some kind of hate group."

"It wasn't—" I tried to say, but Hodge cut me off.

"I doubt that she had much of a choice."

Clary was silent for a second before responding, her voice quieter.

"What are you talking about? Why wouldn't she have a choice?"

Hodge looked at her sympathetically before responding.

"Because, she was Valentine's wife."

* * *

**Hope you liked it! Don't forget to review if you did :)**

**-Cassidy**


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